Intercontinental Press

Africa Asia Europe Ocean/a the Americas Vol. 13, No. 7 CD1975 by Intercontinental Press February 24, 1975

Fighting in Cambodia Pentagon Doubles

Airlift Operation to Pnompenh

LON NOL; Are you ready to die for him?

French Army Draftees Fight for Rights

'Irish Republican Socialist Party' Formed 'Officials' Split Over Stalinist Power Play

t Troops Out of Ireland,' Say London Marchers

Tim Wohlforth Workers League and the International Committee Out to Lick Inflation

In This Issue Closing Date: February 17, 1975

Ford WINs Queen BRITAIN Ford WINs Queen 600 Protest Threat to Abortion Law President Ford's canipaign to Whip —by Phyllis Hamilton and Bridget Lux Inflation Now (WIN) never got off "Troops Out of Ireland," Say Marchers the ground in the United States. But Russell Foundation Under Attack Immigrant Worker Wins Victory it seems to have swept the Queen of —by Kevin Thomas England off her feet. The royalclothes- FRANCE Draftees Demand Rights—by F.L. Derry horse asked Parliament on February LOR Holds First Congress 12 to boost her living allowance by SINGAPORE Tan Wah Plow Victim of Frame-up Charges $1 million a year. —by Peter Conrick Inflation, according to the queen, IRELAND "Officials" Split Over Stalinist Power Play—by Gerry Foley has eaten into her annual$2.35 million MOZAMBIQUE Thousands Face Famine budget to such a degree that she can ITALY Reveal Truman Readied Troops In 1948 to no longer make ends meet. The so Block Electoral Victory of CP —by Dick FIdler lution? WIN, obviously. Dock Workers Win Partial Victory Prime Minister Harold Wilson told —by Sharad Jhaverl the House of Commons that the queen CAMBODIA Pentagon Doubles Airlift to Lon Nol needed the dough. In real terms, he —by Peter Green explained, to meet the queen's request BELGIUM Workers Combat Advancing Recession —by Marcel Smet meant no increase at all in her pay ARAB EAST Habash Scores Palestinian "MInlstate" Deal because it would only make up for URUGUAY Jurists Document Repression what inflation had taken away. DOCUMENTS The Workers League and the International Committee—by Tim Wohlforth The new leader of the Conservative Turkish Workers Fight for Own Unions party, Margaret Thatcher, drew cheers Protest by Draftees From the Antilles when she welcomed the queen's plea for The Appeal of the One Hundred help. The royal household, she said, In Defense of the Draguignan Defendants "is our most precious asset." Brazilian Censors' "Forbidden Topics" Jeremy Thorpe, leader of the Liberal The Struggle for Kurdish Autonomy party, spoke understandingly of the AROUND THE WORLD FROM OUR READERS queen's plight. "Inflation,"he said, "in BOOKS 265 Chronicle of Current Events evitably hits any head of state in what —by Marilyn Vogt ever system it is operated." DRAWINGS 256 Lon Nol; 260, George Habash; 267; Pyotr Left-wing members of the Labour Yakir; 269, Anatoly Marchenko; 276, Andres Perez—by Copain party responded to Wilson's message EN ESPANOL: with hoots, jeers, and catcalls. William 277 DIscurso de Trotsky en el Funeral de Joffe Hamilton, a Member of Parliament PERU 272 Explosion Popular Sacude Regimen from Scotland, went to such extremes VENEZUELA 275 Respuesta de la Liga Soclallsta a la as to say that he would propose leg Naclonallzaclon del HIerro 278 Presos Soclallstas islation to "nationalize the Queen." ARGENTINA That he would actually do anything that radical was doubted. It was just his way of talking. Buckingham Palace reported thatthe royal staff at the end of 1974 consisted of 463 hands. Among these are ladies Intercontinental Press, P.O. Box 1 16, Villoge Station, which may not necessarily coincide with those of Inter in waiting, butlers, grooms, stable New York, N.Y. 10014. continental Press. Insofar as if reflects editorial opinion, hands, cooks, footmen, private secre EDITOR: Joseph Hansen. unsigned material expresses the standpoint of revolu- CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Pierre Frank, Livio Maitan, fionory Marxism. taries, financial officers, and public Ernest Mandel, George Novack. PARIS OFFICE: Pierre Frank, 10 Impasse Guemenee, relations experts. EDITORIAL STAFF: Michael Baumann, Gerry Foley, 75004, Paris, France. Besides the $2.35 million pin money Ernest Harsch, Judy White. TO SUBSCRIBE: For one year send S15 to Interconti she receives from state funds, thequeen BUSINESS MANAGER: Rebo Hansen. nental Press, P.O. Box 116, Village Station, New York, ASSISTANT BUSINESS MANAGER: Steven Warshell. N.Y. 10014. Write for rotes on first class and airmail. has a tax-free income from 52,000 COPY EDITOR: Mary Roche. Special rates available for subscriptions to coloniol acres of royal estates. In 1970, the TECHNICAL STAFF: Bill Burton, Jomes M. Morgan. ond semicoloniol countries. last time her income from this source Subscription correspondence should be addressed to was made public, the take was Published in New York eoch Monday except last in Intercontinental Press, P.O. Box 1 16, Village Station, $720,000. December ond first in Jonuory; not published in August. New York, N.Y. 10014. Because of the continuing dete Intercontinental Press specializes in political analysis rioration of the U.S. postal system, pleose allow five The size of the queen's fortune has and interpretation of events of porticulor interest to weeks for change of address. Include your old oddress never been made public. Estimates the labor, socialist, colonial independence. Black, and OS well OS your new address, and, if possible, on range from $120 million to $240 mil women's liberotion movements. address label from a recent issue. lion. □ Signed articles represent the views of the authors. Copyright © 1975 by Intercontinental Press Intercontinental Press Broad Protest Movement Started by a Handful

French Army Draftees Demand Democratic Rights By F. L. Derry

Paris democratic rights that are the mark of up affair is Mr. Alain Krivine. . . ," "If the army was not affected by military life in France. claimed the conservative daily Le Fi the events of 1968," Francis Cornu A broad and impressive movement garo. "His program for national de said in the January 7 Le Monde, "it in defense of the "200" stalled the gov fense can be summed up in these few was only a brief respite. The young ernment's retaliatory measures for words: The bourgeois army must be draftees of 1974 have lived the heri more than two months. It was only destroyed. The Draguignan defendants tage of 1968 in the high schools, at in November that the government felt were the first three mines planted by their places of work, and, having ob confident enough to arrest the three his organization to set off an explo tained the right to vote, i are full citi soldiers. The arrests touched off one sion in the ranks." zens. They no longer accept having of the broadest political defense efforts But the response of the soldiers them their rights and civil liberties tempo in recent French history. It was selves was somewhat more dramatic: rarily suspended, if only for twelve a movement that grew, at long last, Within days a "second Draguignan" months. In their view, military regula to include many locals of the CFDT,2 took place. On January 13, several tions and discipline are all the more the CGT,3 and the FEN.4 It received hundred French soldiers (the military intolerable since the principles and tra backing even from the PCF5 and PS.6 officials say 150; the Gomitd de De dition being pressed on them seem out The extent and seriousness of this de fense des Appel6s says more than 300) moded and irrelevant: Why is there fense were registered emphatically in stationed at Karlsruhe in Germany a need for military service? What kind the verdict: Taurus was acquitted and staged a similar demonstration, hold of defense? . . . Forced conscription Pelletier and Ravet received one-year ing a general assembly in the morning has been abolished in a number of sentences, mostly suspended, and they and then, joined by other soldiers, foreign countries, and its retention in have already been released. taking to the streets in a peaceful pro France has for a long time been the "The trial has demonstrated what a test for more than an hour before re object of discussion inside the mili farce the military courts are," was the turning to base. So far, no arrests tary high command." response of the Comity de Defense des have heen announced. Nearly 275,000 soldiers —half of Appel^s (Committee for the Defense The three central demands of the the French armed forces—are draft of Draftees). "They must be abolished, Karlsruhe action involved free trans ees, and the protest movement that along with the military's security portation to allow soldiers on leave has been spreading rapidly through branch." to visit their families in France, an their ranks has aroused fear among The January 10 Z,e Monde reported increase in the number of leaves grant both military officers and government the reaction of the Ligue Communiste ed, and inclusion of soldiers under officials. Neither the carrot nor the R^volutionnaire, the French Trotsky- provisions of the minimum-wage law. stick, neither appeasement nor repres ist organization that has helped spear Underlying the demands, however, sion, seem able to contain the growing head the defense campaign: "The de was a questioning by the young draft protest, which was recently focused on termination and courage shown by the ees of the French army's right to sta a military courtroom in Marseilles. soldiers of Draguignan and the un tion its troops outside of French bor On trial January 7 and 8 were three precedented mobilization of the entire ders. young draftees—26-year-old Robert workers movement have demonstrated "For several weeks now," Le Monde Pelletier, 21-year-old Alex Taurus, that it is possible to block the plans pointed out January 14, "the solidar and 20-year-old Serge Ravet. All faced of the bourgeoisie and the military ity committees, for the most part made serious charges under Article 71 of the hierarchy." up of militants close to Mr. Alain Military Code of Justice for "incitement "The only winner in this trumped- Krivine's Ligue Communiste R6volu- to commit acts contrary to duty and tionnaire, have heen meeting in the general discipline." Federal German Republic to lay the 2. Confederation Francaise et Democra- The three were accused of being the groundwork for new forms of protest tique du Travail — French Democratic action in the army." ringleaders of the September 10 "dem Confederation of Labor. onstration at Draguignan," during How extensive is the protest of the which 200 draftees at the small mili 3. Confederation General du Travail — soldiers and what support do the sol tary base near Draguignan in south Generai Confederation of Labor. diers' actions have within the army ern France took to the streets in the ranks, not to speak of civilian so first public demonstration of soldiers 4. Federation de 1'Education Nationale— ciety as a whole? How, and why, did against the oppressive conditions, National Education Federation. this movement develop? And, most rampant racism, and restrictions on 5. Parti Communiste Francais—French important, how was it possible to score Communist party. a relative success in defending these 1. The voting age in France was lowered three soldiers? to eighteen years in June 1974. 6. Parti Sociaiiste— Socialist party. All young men, at the age of eigh- February 24, ]975 teen, face the draft in France. Mili that has finally had its impact in the mands for basic democratic rights was tary service is for one year, although composition of the ranks of the army supported by most soldiers. It formed an alternative service called "coope itself. In December, a group of soldiers the base for a broad, civilian sup ration," involving such choices as at a clandestine news conference in port movement. Most important, it teaching in one of France's former Paris described this process: struck a responsive chord among the (or current) colonies, for example, "The young Breton peasants from draftees. Within three months, 3,000 may take up to two years. The dis the 'milk war' are in the army. The soldiers had signed the appeal, and cipline and living conditions are CET8 student strikers of last year the figure is now approaching 5,500. among the most obnoxious of all the are in the army. The high-school stu Thus began what Le Monde de imperialist armies. Draftees receive 2 dents who demonstrated two years ago scribed as "a movement whose scope francs a day (one franc equals about against the Debr6 law are in the army. must have surprised not only the high US$0.23) for a total of 60 francs Soon the young postal workers who command but even the far-left organi a month. carried out the strikes in November zations that had launched it, as well Many young draftees have families will be in the army. The young mili as the left-wing parties and trade to support, which is obviously impos tant workers of the last few years are unions that up until now have main sible for them under these conditions. already there. They are exactly what tained a certain coolness toward var Officers can levy fines, to be paid the military brass has in mind when ious efforts to launch a struggle in the out of the soldier's meager "wage" for it talks about the 'enemy within.'" army, efforts often judged to be too such offenses as having a button miss radically antimilitarist." ing. They can also order the imprison Appeal of the One Hundred As the number of signers of the ment of any soldier, without trial, for appeal grew, the government was up to two months. In addition, other, These forces came together during forced to retreat on its campaign of more informal, forms of punishment the presidential election campaign in intimidation and repression with which such as 'hazing" are common. May 1974 to produce the first sig it had greeted the new movement. The Racism is also a serious problem. nificant protest among the soldiers big stick was replaced by the carrot This is particularly true for the many themselves. In the last days before of reforms when Defense Minister Souf- soldiers who come from the French the second round of voting on May flet announced last August a "liberali colonies in the Antilles. These Black 19, a petition addressed to the presi zation" of discipline. For example, soldiers are often assigned the most dential candidates, signed by 100 sol some left newspapers from the trade menial tasks, such as sweeping floors, diers, was made public. The "Appel unions, and I'Humanite, the newspa and face the most severe punishments. des Cent" (Appeal of the One Hun- per of the French Communist party, In addition, the soldiers are saddled dred)9 called for a free choice of in would be allowed in the barracks. with an officer caste renowned on a duction date until the age of twenty- However, Rouge, the revolutionary world scale for its reactionary charac five,lo payment of the legal minimum weekly organ of the French Trotsky- ter. This is the grouping that pro wage, abolition of arbitrary discipline, ists; Crosse-en-l'air, the journal of the duced not only the 'Dreyfus Affair" and an end to all postings abroad. Committee for the Defense of Draftees; at the end of the nineteenth century In addition, the petition demanded and similar papers were still banned. but the Secret Army Organization ter the right of soldiers to read any po "But these measures," Cornu said ror and torture squads during the Al litical material they choose and to in Le Monde, "were too late and, in gerian war. freely express their opinions. These any event, too little." The demonstra Antimilitarist sentiment was on the rights are denied soldiers whose mail tion at Draguignan followed the "Souf- rise in France even before the mas is opened by the SM (Security Mili- flet reforms" by only three weeks. sive general strike of 1968. The taire, the military police), which con French colonial wars in Algeria and fiscates all left-wing journals. Indochina, followed by the American The original signers came from ar The Protest at Draguignan military effort in Vietnam, have left my bases all over the country, and their mark, as has the use of the the text had apparently been circu Draguignan itself is a small base French army to "restore order" in lated among many small clandestine with fewer than 1,000 soldiers. Af>- 1968 and break strikes since then. groups of draftees associated with the proximately 200 took part in the dem For some years a specifically anti- various revolutionary organizations onstration and many others would militarist movement has been grow on the French left. But, from the be have but were at other locations at ing. In the spring of 1973, massive ginning, the Appeal of the One Hun the time. If there was any distinguish demonstrations of French high-school dred met with a much broader re ing characteristic of the Nineteenth students took place against the 'De- sponse than just that of revolution RA (Regiment d'Artillerie), Draguig br^ law,"^ which eliminated students' ists. The reasonable nature of the de- nan, it was probably the large num military deferments. Recently, military ber of Black soldiers from the French documents were published showing colony in the Antilles, who are sub 8. Colleges d'Enseignement Technique — that the officers view their main threat ject to racial abuse on the part of Technical Education Schools. today as coming from the "enemy with the racist officer caste. The protest against this racism merged with the in," that is, students and workers af 9. See text elsewhere in this issue. fected by domestic social unrest. It sentiments voiced in the Appeal of the One Hundred to produce the dem is the growth of this "enemy within" 10. Instead of the current obligatory in duction at age eighteen. This was the onstration. 7. See Intercontinental Press April 2, central demand in the "anti-Debre law" The Appeal of the One Hundred April 9, April 16, April 23, 1973. struggles the previous year. campaign was organized on the base

Intercanfinenfal Press Soldiers marched In Droguignon September 1 0 to press demands for their rights.

by a "soldiers committee" of about ers and also subject to racist abuse) by the military authorities."12 thirty members. Activity spread indicated their support. Finally, with Among the signers were the reform among Black soldiers from the An perfect discipline, the 200 returned to ist mass workers organizations such tilles, who drew up a separate text, ii the base, where they engaged one of as the Communist and Socialist par in addition to the appeal, dealing spe their commanding officers in a one- ties, trade unions such as the CFDT cifically with the racist treatment they hour public discussion on the condi and the FO, 13 as well as revolution receive. tions at the base. After obtaining a ists such as the FOR. Such broad On September 9, this text was dis promise that the conditions would be unity is rare in France, where the tributed in the form of a leaflet. An "investigated," the soldiers returned to Communist party refuses to have any additional 100 soldiers, many of them their barracks. relations with the Trotskyists—indeed from the Antilles, signed the appeal. they refused to sign any subsequent That night the committee met with Defense Against Army Crackdown joint statements. Nevertheless, this uni delegates from every barracks and ty in defense of the soldiers, no matter The repercussions were consider decided to launch a demonstration the how briefly achieved, successfully halt able. Within a few weeks, a similar next day. In spite of these preliminary ed further repression for several attempt to stage a demonstration at preparations, the officers remained un months. an army base near Strasbourg was aware of the plans for the action. Suddenly, without warning, Pelletier, broken up when the officers were given As soldiers gathered for lunch the Ravet, and Taurus were arrested No advance notice by an informer they next day, representatives of the com vember 10. Pelletier, on his way home had planted in the ranks. Nine sol mittee gave speeches, and virtually while on leave, was illegally arrested diers at Draguignan were put under all the soldiers present joined in a on the train platform by civilian po detention without trial. Further repres march to present their grievances to lice and kept in a civilian jail in isola sion was forestalled, however, by a the prefecture—the highest civilian tion from his fellow soldiers. broad united effort to defend the administrative authority in the area. The two months from the arrests draftees. When the prefect refused to accept the until the trial on January 7 saw the "The undersigned organizations, development of the broadest defense list of demands from his 200 uninvited meeting September 11, 1974, affirm guests, the soldiers decided to march effort on behalf of the soldiers move their solidarity with the draftees of the ment. For the first time, important through the streets of Draguignan to 19th RA of Draguignan" began one sectors of the trade unions were in emphasize their protest. of the many leaflets of support cir For the next two hours as the sol volved. The Comit6 de Soutien aux culated after the demonstration. diers marched, the local residents Soldats de Draguignan et Tons les "These organizations declare their (most of whom are immigrant work- readiness to mobilize for and defend 12. See full text elsewhere in this issue. the draftees in the face of any sanc 11. See text elsewhere in this issue. tions that may be taken against them 13. Force Ouvriere—Labor Force. February 24, ]975 Soldats Emprisonn6s (Committee to from a previously agreed upon joint had never before taken part in any Support the Draguignan Soldiers and public meeting with the CFDT in de movement. . . . All Imprisoned Soldiers) was formed fense of the soldiers. Why? Because, "In this regard, it should be noted as an ad hoc group of notables to said the Stalinist labor officials, the that many young Communists were organize the defense. This committee CFDT was allowing to enter "through among the first to sign the Appeal of included revolutionists such as Pierre the window the grouplets that the the One Hundred." Frank and Alain Krivine of the FOR, CFDT should, in our opinion, have representatives from Lutte Ouvriere thrown put the front door." Needless Soldiers Press Ahead and Revolution!, and both wings of to say, the Stalinists were absent from the PSU. 14 Major intellectual figures the raUy of nearly 3,000 at the Mu In addition to the broad and im pressive defense effort, the soldiers such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone tuality that launched the defense com movement has itself grown. de Beauvoir were also sponsors. mittee just as they were absent from the slightly larger demonstration in In December a clandestine news con However, significant by their ab ference was held by soldiers from thir Paris just before the trial began. sence were the leaders of the Commu teen bases of the French army sta nist party and the major figures in tioned in Germany. Wearing masks the Socialist party such as Frangois to hide their identity, they said in Mitterrand. Nor did the national lead Campaign Rolls On front of the German television cameras erships of the CFDT and CGT support that there were now more than twenty the defense committee. It is important In spite of the Stalinists' sabotage soldiers committees and a dozen clan to note that several councils (Union of a united defense campaign, sup destine journals among the 60,000 Local) of the CFDT, which include port for the soldiers mounted. A small French troops (half of them draftees) aU CFDT branches in a city, and even trickle of CFDT locals began to issue stationed in Germany. ". . .the Appeal one Union D6partementale, which in statements defending the soldiers. of the One Hundred has changed cludes all CFDT units in a depart Some of them endorsed the united de everything in the barracks. It forms ment, Le., many ULs, adhered to the fense committee. The trickle became the basis for discussion on the de committee. an important stream and finally in mands of draftees. Draguignan has cluded locals and even nationalfedera- shown, despite the repression, what Stalinist Hatchetmen at Work tions of the CGT itself. The Commu it is possible to do in the barracks, nist and Socialist parties were forced that it is possible to open your mouth." This illustrates one of the central to issue statements in support of the The next week a similar news con political problems in France—the ex three soldiers (while refraining from ference was held in Paris by repre treme difficulty in getting the Com joining the defense committee). Both sentatives of twenty soldiers commit munist party, without doubt the most organizations sent witnesses to testify tees based in France. "It is true, of powerful organized force in the French on behalf of the draftees. course," the representatives said, "that workers movement, to work in a com Support came mostly from smaU the membership of these committees mon front around even the most lim union locals and shop committees, makes up no more than an active ited activities with revolutionists such particularly from CFDT branches minority on the bases. But this mi as the French Trotskyists. This is even among postal and hospital workers, nority can easily win the recognition true in areas where the CP has a cer bank workers, insurance company and support of the majority, as was tain self-interest—such as stopping the clerks, and teachers. shown by the Draguignan demonstra repression in the army which extends However, support also came from tion, to take one example. The ma to its own members. The CP's sec steelworkers, electricians, and railroad jority recognizes its common interests tarianism may go to extreme lengths workers in the CGT. The national with the committees, with their and be very damaging to a common congress of the Union Syndicate de demands, even if it does not take the defense effort, as the foUowing example I'Aviation Civile, a CGT union, passed important step leading to clandestine wiU clearly show. a statement defending PeUetier, Ravet, organizing in the barracks. . . . When the Committee to Support the and Taurus ("even though the first of "It is often the Appeal of the One Draguignan Soldiers was formed, the these three Draguignan draftees is Hundred that gives isolated individu UL-CFDT in Gennevilliers near Paris close to the Ligue Communiste Ry- als the idea of forming a group to get was one of the sponsors; it agreed to volutionnaire," Le Monde pointed out). something done. . . ." use its address as a "postal drop" "Just a few months ago," Francis It seems clear that in the soldiers for the committee. Roger PeUetier is Cornu said in the January 7 Le movement today there are at least a member of this local and its endorse Monde, "the opposition political par several dozen more or less stable func ment was considered quite a break ties and the unions maintained an tioning soldiers committees, publish through for the defense effort. How attitude of reserve, if not complete hos ing clandestine journals, organizing ever, a letter was soon received from tility, toward the antimilitarism of the the Appeal of the One Hundred, and the CGT local for the same area, at leftist groups, calling it 'puerile' and occasionally organizing demonstra tacking the CFDT for joining the com 'demagogic.' Since that time they have tions. Each of these committees has mittee on the grounds that Krivine learned that the movement set off by a real possibility of developing at and Sartre were members of the com the 'Appeal of the One Hundred' has least a solid relationship with other mittee. The CGT local then withdrew reached not only a number of young soldiers— a relationship in which these people who were in no way 'leftists,' committees are able to provide leader 14. Parti Socialiste Unifie— United So but even their own members . . . and, ship for a serious struggle for demo cialist party. an important fact, young people who cratic rights in the army.

Intercontinental Press The type of relationship developed police and the jurisdiction of special at the annual council of the AUS held with the ranks will depend on many military courts and judges. To allow in Melbourne, which began on January things —the ability of these committees the free and unhampered functioning 29. During a specieil session of council devoted to the repression of the student to take advantage of limited openings of political parties and trade unions movement in Southeast Asia, the council in the army would make it very dif under adverse conditions and extreme resolved to conduct an extensive defence repression, their ability to avoid ficult to break strikes and fight colo campaign on behalf of Tan and all of unnecessary victimization of their own nial wars in the future. To question those who suffer at the hands of the re members and of their fellow soldiers, the right of an imperialist army to gimes such as those in Singapore, Malay and the extent to which they can de assign its troops at will, where sia, and Indonesia. velop effective civilian support. With it wants, anywhere in the world is Both Malaysian and Australian student out such support, there is little likeli objectively to question the right of leaders reported on the reasons behind the frame-up of Taa These observers agree hood of the soldiers movement sur imperialism to exist. To question the that the Singapore government's aim to viving for long. need for a bourgeois army by "gef Tan intensified Eifter incidents during No bourgeois army can tolerate a demanding democratic rights very the University of Singapore's orientation truly democratic internal regime. An quickly leads in the direction of ques week for 1974. Tan made a fiery attack imperialist army relies on military tioning capitalist society itself. □ on the university administration and the Lee Kuan Yew regime in general during the official welcoming ceremony. As presi dent of the student union. Tan told the new Singapore Police Moke 'Example' of Student Leader students that he had little advice to offer them, except, "to do what the students of Thailand have already done." (In Octo ber 1973 mass student demonstrations overthrew the Thai military regime.) All Tan Woh Piow Victim of Frame-up Charges the evidence points to the fact that Tan is being used as an example to students and By Peter Conrick workers in Singapore. This trial is clearly a political trial [The following article appeared in the is becoming concerned with the growth aimed at removing leaders of the student Fd)ruary 7 issue of Direct Action, a rev of regional student solidarity and the role movement, to prevent criticism of the Lee olutionary-socialist fortnightly published AUS has played in this development. government and the government-con in Sydney.] After the expulsion of Macdonald, AUS trolled trade unions. It also seeks to iso immediately arranged for l?vo other peo late Singapore students from their sup ple to fly to Singapore to attend the trial. porters elsewhere in the region. One top They were the federal secretary of the Singapore official was quoted in the De Despite widespread protests in Southeast Food Preservers' Union, Tom Ryan, and cember 28 Melbourne Age as saying that Asia and Australia, the Singapore govern Melbourne journalist George Coote. Ryan the "Governments of Malaysia, Singapore ment is pressing ahead with the frame-up reported that the charges against Tan and Indonesia are fed up with AUS med trial of Tan Wah Piow, the president of were being heard by a district judge with dling in their internal affairs" and that the University of Singapore Students out a jury. The judge also reserved the "Australia might well turn out to be the Union. sole power to decide if Tan had a right home for the New Left in this part of the Tan, 23, and two Malaysian workers of appcEil. world." have been charged with criminal trespass Another problem for Tan emerged It is obvious that a strong defence move and riot. The charges arose after inci around the refusal of the court to adjourn ment must be built for Tan Wah Piow. dents at the University of Singapore in until a suitable lawyer could be engaged. In order to bring maximum pressure to October last year. Singapore students had In the light of these circumstances the bear on the Singapore government to initiated an unemployment relief centre AUS asked top Melbourne barrister drop the charges, this movement must be and taken over a building on campus Frank Galbally to defend the student lead international in scope. □ from which to run their operations. Po er. Galbally sought official permission to lice eventually broke up the centre^ defend Tan, but each time he phoned the damaging records and fUes. At the time Singapore attorney general the latter was the police were wrecking the building. Tan "unavailable." Eventually Galbally flew to PLO Condemns Hijackings was not present, but the charges attri Singapore to attend the trial as an observ bute responsibility for what happened to er. He was able to speak to Tan, eilthough The Palestine Liberation Organization Tan. his presence in Singapore was obviously announced January 29 that it would un The tried opened on December 11 amidst not welcomed by the authorities. Galbally dertake to "control criminal elements" en a growing campaign by the Singapore said that there was good evidence to sug gaged in the hijacking of airplanes, ships, and Malaysian governments against stu gest that his family had been investigated or trains. A PLO official told reporters, dent activists. This has included further during their stay on the island. His chil "We condemn hijackings and we will pre attacks on the Australian Union of Stu dren had reported being questioned by vent them." dents (AUS), which has campaigned for strangers on the street about their father's Reporters in Syria were shown a PLO many years on behalf of victimised stu role in the trial. camp said to hold about seventy prison dents in other countries. [See Interconti Galbally stated to the press on his re ers, ranging from men who had been nental Press,' January 13, p. 10, for a turn to Australia that Tan was not getting drinking on duty to others who had tried report of previous attacks on AUS by a fair trial. Examples of this included to "sabotage" the Palestinian movement the Malaysian authorities.] the refusal to aUow Tan to continue cross- PLO representatives said that hijackings The president-elect of AUS, Ian Mac- examination of the main prosecution wit would be punished by prison sentences of donald, was ordered to leave Singapore ness whenever his questioning attacked up to fifteen years, and by death in cases after he arrived to attend the Tan trial. the credibility of the witness. where persons were killed in the course It is clear that the Singapore government The Tan case was a focus of attention of the hijacking.

February 24, 1975 'Irish Republican Socialist Party' Formed 1949. For a while the leadership of the Hungarian Working Peoples Party fell un der the control of a power-hungry group headed by Rakosi which imprisoned and executed innocent working people. This 'Officials' Split Over Stalinist Power Play group was defeated and expelled from the HWSP and from power. The western By Gerry Foley press and bourgeois politicians tried to use these events to justify the counter revolution in 1956. This attack on the working people was the last-ditch stand [First of a series] year when many dedicated members were of the fascist and right-wing elements who The "Official" republican ard-fheis (na purged from the organisation because they tried to turn back the clock of history. tional convention) held last November 30- dared to question the reformist approach They assassinated socialists and took over December 1 in Dublin formally conclud of the Ard Comhairle on many vital ques buildings and fired on workers killing ed a struggle that surfaced in the late tions. This purge culminated in attempts many of them. The government asked spring of 1972 and moved into its final by members of the Ard Comhairle to for the intervention of Soviet Troops who stage one year later. intimidate delegates to the recent Ard assisted in defeating the counter-revolu In a closed session, the ard-fheis voted Fheis, when many of them were threat tion The former fascist leader, Horthy, ened with expulsion if they did not vote by 197 votes to 15 to confirm the ex by now safely ensconced in Portugal called pulsion of Seamus Costello, a Wicklow in accordance with the wishes of on the U.S. to invade Hungary. But the County councillor and formerly one of the Leadership. U.S. which had irresponsibly egged on "C) The decision of the Ard Comhairle the central figures in the top "Official" the right-wing elements realised that they leadership. to contest the Six County Assembly Elec would be faced by the whole socialist However, it quickly became clear that tions, when it was perfectly obvious that power of the workers of Eastern Europe the expulsion of Costello and certain of the elections were clearly designed to re and drew back at the last minute." his supporters did not solve the problem establish a British-Controlled puppet Par There were other Stalinist articles in that he apparently represented for his for liament for the Six Counties. In our view the same issue. In fact, the issue was mer associates in the "Official" leadership. this particular decision was indicative of Stalinist from beginning to end. This line Instead, the struggle broke out into the the reformist and counter revolutionary has now been carried for three successive open, where it seemed to create much attitudes which prevail at Ard Comhairle greater difficulties for this leadership than Level in Sinn Fein, Gardiner Place. it had at the ard-fheis or in the internal "D) The unprincipled betrayal of the in battle that preceded it. Nor did the re ternees arising from the decision to take Use of Physical Violence lationship of forces seem as uneven as seats on local councils in the North. This This turn toward open Stalinism in the the vote that confirmed Costello's expul decision was made despite the fact that the "Official" organ has been accompanied by sion. Ard Comhairle had made repeated state a campaign to enforce rigid conformity At the end of the week, on December 7, ments attacking the treachery of the within the organization and by a series the Irish Times reported: S.D.L.P. [Social Democratic and Labour of physical attacks on supporters of the "At a meeting in Dublin yesterday which party, the bourgeois nationalists] for tak new party. was attended by 80 delegates from Dub ing their seats." On January 15, the IRSP issued a state lin, Wicklow, Limerick, Tipperary, Clare, The first two points seem to be the fun ment saying that in the past four weeks Cork, Belfast, Derry City, and county damental ones. The others deal with tac four of its members or supporters in the Armagh and Donegal, a decision was tical questions around which general dis Belfast area had been kidnapped and as made to form a new political party, the satisfaction with the course of the organ saulted. Two members had been shot and Irish Republican Socialist Party." ization had tended to crystallize. seriously wounded. It accused the The founders of the IRSP included a The Gardiner Placeleadershipresponded "Officials" of trying to assassinate one of number of prominent figures who had by saying that the new group represented its leaders, Ronald Bunting. left the "Official" republican organization only a handful of ultraleftists. As in pre "When they found that Mr. Bunting was during 1974 or who had been expelled. vious republican splits, the real issues not at home," the statement said, "they Signers of the initial statement of prin were not brought out. ciples and aims included Seamus Cos attempted to kill his wife and 18 month old daughter instead, by firing shots into tello as well as a number of former lead Sharp Shift In Line ing members of the Derry Republican the house when she refused to open the Club, who had been dissidents within the However, a noticeable change occurred door." organization for some time—Terry Rob- in the line of the "Official" organ, the The IRSP "hereby restates its determina son, Seamus O'Kane, and Joe Sweeney. monthly United Irishman, following the tion to continue with the organisation of a Bernadette (Devlin) McAliskey, who has conclusion of the fight with Costello in party structure despite these murderous never been a member of the "Official" re side the organization. The December issue attempts on if, its members and sup publicans, although she has supported published the first of a series of articles porters. . . ." some of their campaigns, also signed the on the "socialist countries." It dealt with The statement appealed to the "Official" statement. the "economic miracle in the East," the membership to demand an end to the The following reasons were given for German Democratic Republic. The second campaign of intimidation "We are con the formation of the new party: one took up "The Hungarian People's fident that the vast majority of rank and "A) The refusal of the Sinn Fein Ard Republic," and the third, Poland. file members of the Officials stUl support Comhairle [National Executive] to imple The article on Hungary included par the principles on which the civil rights ment the democratically decided policies ticularly aggressive Stalinist propaganda: struggle was organised, and that they on the National Question as laid down "The present socialist state in Hungary reject the terrorist activities being carried at the 1972 and 1973 Ard Fheiseanna. is the conclusion of hundreds of years out in their name." "B) The lack of internal democracy with of human struggle for dignity and free In fact, the Donegal organization of in Sinn Fein. This became particularly dom. The difficulties did not end with the the "Officials" passed a resolution calling noticeable during the course of the past assumption of power by the workers in on the national leadership to end the at-

Intercontinental Press tacks on the IRSP. It was supported by Bulgarian wine that awaited the people What has tended to happen is that a Seam us Rogers, a county councillor and of the Six Counties if they united with layer of young centrists, representing in one of the four or five "Official" figures the Dublin regime, which had a more general the lowest level of the interna with a significant local following. progressive policy on trade with the "so tional youth radicalization, have begun The only way the Gardiner Place lead cialist countries." to exercise an essentially bureaucratic in ership can convince people that it is not Republicans are expected to have an fluence in the organization in alliance with employing such methods would be to dis answer for the national questions that some of the more politicized caudillos, avow them publicly and demonstrate in confront the Irish people. And the vapid who seem mostly Stalinist-influenced. The fact that it is prepared to engage in politi cliches about "peacd' and "people?' in the young centrists have all the vices of the cal debate with the new party. Both the last issues of the United Irishman dodge "new leff student demagogues — mindless tradition of the movement and its own the issua populism, economism, third-worldist ro espousal of Stalinism are certainly manticism, cynicism, intellectuEil arro grounds for suspicion about how it in Justified Expulsion? gance, and a fondness for petty-bourgeois tends to handle political oppositioa intrigue. They have learned just enough The Donegal resolution, however, is an Some "Official" representatives have ar to be dogmatic without having learned indication that many members of the "Of the first thing about political principles. ficials" neither accept Stalinism nor politi gued that the expulsion of Costello and Charges of "personalism" by Gardiner cal gangsterism. Now is the time for all his supporters was democratic and that of those to speak up. violations of democratic procedure were Place leaders cannot be taken seriously Democracy has always been a chancy on the other sida untU they have succeeded in training cad thing in republican organizations. The For example, the Irish Times reported res who can win the respect and loyalty effective rights of members have tended February 7: "A Belfast Republican Club of the membership. UntU that time, the to depend on the relationship of forces yesterday attacked the Irish Republican real leadership wUl devolve on caudUlos, or the distance from the leadership. On Socialist Party as'so-called socialists' and all pious claims to the contrary. the other hand, the organization has ed- said the party had made slanderous at Costello at least, unlike the rest of the ways been too heterogeneous and loosely tacks on the leadership of the Official "Official" leadership, has been realistic organized to develop a bureaucratic ma Republican movement. enough to say that the economist line of chine that could really suppress serious "In a statement, the Henry Munro Re recent years was not working, that the political differences. Such attempts have publican Club, based on the St. James's organization was becoming more and simply led to splits and open warfare, Road area of the Upper Falls, said that more isolated among the nationalist-mind shattering the organization. the 1. R. S. P. had not looked carefully at ed people, that the membership was be A Stalinist leadership is quEilitatively its own leadership. 'If they did, then the coming demoralized and indifferent, and different from the clumsy and inconsis penny would finally drop and the person that the organization was becoming a tent authoritarianism that is well known responsible for their press releases would paralyzed and dying sect in the death in the republican movement. Leaders in realise that people in glass houses grip of Stalinist mandarins. spired by the rigid Stalinism reflected in shouldn't throw stones. These so-called If the leadership could defeat Costello the recent issues of the United Irishman socialists have boasted a membership of openly in a democratic contest, why did will not rest untU they have rooted out 600 throughout Ireland and claim they they never teU the truth about the state of not only all opposition but any hint of are in the process of setting up another the organization? The organizational re independent thinking. 50 branches. This, to us, seems highly ports have become more and more ob Since it is the newspaper of the move unlikely for two reasons, the first being vious fabrications in the last two years. ment, the membership cannot avoid re that 600 members have not been expelled The account of the American affUiate of sponsibility for what the United Irishman from the Official movement, and the the "Officials" is a prime example. says. The inescapable fact is that the news second being that 600 people would not paper of the "Official" rqDublican move be stupid enough to join a party not ment has in the case of Hungary sup knowing that party's policy.'" 'From Strength to Strength' ported the bloody subjection of a small The statement accused the IRSP of not "The Third Annual Convention of the nation by a great power and repeated offering any concrete alternative to the Irish Republican Clubs of the United the bureaucratic lies that were concocted policies of the "Officials." It blamed the States and Canada was held recenUy in to justify this. What a position for re split on Costello's refusal "to abide by New York," an anonymous reporter wrote publicans! the democratically chosen policy of the in the December issue of the United Irish Those who fail to speak out against Official movement." It said that any revo man. "Over 70 delegates representing this betrayal of republicanism will never lutionary organization had to defend the Clubs from various parts of North Amer be tEiken seriously as defenders of the uniformity of its line whatever the cost. ica attended and discussed a wide range democratic rights of oppressed peoples. For this local club, the issue in the split of motions dealing with the Irish situation They will never be trusted as defenders was apparently "personalism." For ob and the world wide anti-imperialist strug of Irish independence. vious reasons, the leadership in repub gle. No "Officicd" can escape the questions lican organizations tends to fall to "Since the Republican Clubs were estab that are going to be raised by the Stalinist "caudillos" who are not chosen on the lished in 1970, they have gone from fUth now appearing in the United Irish basis of their political principles or ability strength to strength and have had con man. The Communist party of Ireland and who are difficult to control or sub siderable success in depicting the true na itselfi by sticking to local and practical ordinate to any political line. ture of the struggle in Ireland, despite the issues, can avoid having to answer for Some of the most thoughtful of the re difficulties of the situation and despite the the crimes of the Stalinist regimes. But publican leadership have been deeply con tendencies of many Irish Americans to the Irish CP is not taken seriously as a cerned about this tendency, and it has give emotional support to the Provisionals contender for power. Nor does it repre been a goal of the "Official" movement through a lack of understanding of what sent the revolutionary traditions of the to develop a more political kind of lead is actually happening at home." Irish people. ership. Unfortunately, it has become quite There were seventy persons present, "del The "national liberation" the Irish Stalin clear that neither the leaders of the or egates" or not. That was fewer than the ists seek was summed up a few years ago ganization nor its traditional structures year before and still fewer than the year in an article in their paper, the Irish So have provided the conditions for such a before that. The decline was even more cialist, explaining the delights of cheap leadership to develop. marked if you consider that the conven- February 24, 1975 tion three years ago was held in Boston, to use Sinn Fein for their own disruptive their arguments and their example and whereas the last two have been in New ends. We are not the slightest bit worried only if the "Official" leadership is weaker York, where the number of stray radi about them as a rival for recruits as in this field. cals is many times larger. they are quite welcome to the type of On the other hand, if the "Official" lead The fact is, the "Official" organization in recruit who would be swayed by their ership endorses the bureaucratic betrayers North America, never strong, has become policies and ideas. They have spent the of revolutions and copies their methods, moribund on the national level in the past couple of years trying to divert Sinn it is obvious that they are going to lose last two years. It is totally isolated from Fein into supporting a military campaign the support of those looking for a revo the Irish community and unable to give in the North and in trying to persuade lutionary party. the Provisionals any competition any the IRA to break its ceasefire of May The "Official^' have experienced ultraleft where except in one or two isolated places. 1972. At a time when the whole of Ire splits before. But none has ever damaged The republican leadership in Ireiand land is calling for peace and when that them. It is already clear that more than knows that. It is obvious in their loss of call has forced the Provisionals to call a simple splitoff of ultraleftists or adven interest in the American organization. It is a truce there is little hope for a party turists is involved here. obvious to the members. No one in the de of dissidents whose primary objective moralized and querulous little gathering seems to be to start some kind of military First IRSP Meeting that was described with such cynical bu campaign in the North." reaucratic sycophancy in the United Irish The least that can be said about this The first public meeting of the IRSP man could feel inspired upon reading that fulmination over "Internationalist Socialist in Dublin, according to the February 14 their organization had "gone from infiltration" is that it shows ignorance. Irish Times, drew 500 persons. The main strength to strength." On the other hand, it The International Socialists do not sup speakers were Costello and Bernadette is unfortunate that the "OfficiEd" member port guerriila warfare in the North, what (Devlin) McAIiskey. Both stressed the na ship in Ireland does not know the real ever other errors they may make. And tional question. situation in its American affiliate. their line on the "National Question" is Costello said, according to the Irish There can be no democracy in an or unfortunately not different from that of Times's summary: "Another Left-wing or ganization without elementary truthfulness the Communist party, any number of ganisation was necessary because no to the membership. This type of cynical British economist sects, and stUl more other understood, or had a compre dishonesty hopelessly convicts the Gardi unfortunately, the "Official" republican hensive programme based on, a correct ner Place leadership when they claim that movement. analysis of the relationship between the CosteUo was ousted in a "democratic" national and the class question. There process. Foreign Aid were people claiming to be socialist who If Costello was expelled for rejecting the divorced themselves from the anti-imperi "democratic" decisions of the majority, From Manic Ultralefts alist struggle, others who were prepared significant numbers of the members would to accept an army of occupation and not leave the organization or join his Similar paranoid references to infiltra repressive and anti-working class legis party. There would be no need to intimi tion and nefarious outside influences were lation." date his supporters with physical violence. also contained in the United Irishman's McAIiskey's critique of the economist Nor would many members bedemoralized "explanation" of the split that appeared in position on the national question went by the split. the January issue. The life of the IRSP would be brief, the statement said, "un furthest. It was summarized this way: Another explanation of the split was less foreign aid is received. There are suf "Because of the failure of the Left to given by the Gardiner Place press secre ficient ultra-left, manic organisations in raise the demands relating anti-imperial tary Sean O Cionnaith in the letters col Europe and the USA to ensure them of ism with the class struggle^ they lost rele umn of the Dublin biweekly Hibernia of some support." The writer of this, how vance and the initiative passed to the January 10. He was objecting to an ar ever, was not so foolhardy as O Cion people who, though they had confused ticle on the split by Brian Trench, a leader naith. He did not indicate what groups politics or none, seemed to know what of the Irish affiliate of the International were being referred to. they were doing. The initiative passed Socialists, a British state-capitalist group But how could any thinking member to the Provisional I.R.A. and no-one on that claims to identify with Trotskyism of the "Official" movement take this kind the Left could criticise the Provisionals on some issues. of charge seriously when the same issue without criticising themselves." O Cionnaith wrote "That Ard Fheis of the United Irishman pushed a Stalinist She said: "It was our failure which cre [the 1973 one] saw an attempt by some line that the majority of the membership ated the need for a liberation struggle de of his [Trench's] own colleagues of the do not believe and do not support? Where void of class content." And she pointed Internationalist [sic] Socialists and their did that line come from? And are the only out fdlow-travellers who had infiltrated Sinn foreign influences those emanating from "The fight against the Brits, against in Fein, to cause dissension on a spurious "ultra-left, manic organisations"? ternment and oppression is part of the issue about the 'National Question'. They There are in fact many ultraleft groups same fight to survive in your place of also attempted to gain some seats on the with false and dangerous ideas in Europe work." Ard Comhairle but were decisively de and the United States, as in all other The fact is that the "Officials" have failed feated. areas of the world, including Ireland. But to make an effective link between the na "As a result of their decisive defeat those isn't it a little out of proportion to see tional and the class question. Their dog elements saw little advantage in remaining them as the main threat to the inde matic insistence that Catholic and Protes in a movement in which they never be pendence and principies of the republican tant workers had to be united before any lieved particularly now that they had so movement? revolutionary perspective was possible clearly exposed themselves. . . ." Which of these groups can grant re has reduced them to impotence and iso The "Official" press secretary went on publican leaders and delegations the priv lation. For five years responsible Trot- to say that these "Internationalist Social ileges and illusion of importance that goes skyists have warned them what this would ists" really want to drag the movement with being "official dignitaries"? Which of lead to. into a guerrilla war in the North: these groups has the capacity to corrupt All the projections made by the "Offi "We are quite pleased that the Interna by using material wealth and power? The cials" of a development toward socialism tional Socialists have now set up their ultraleft groups can gain influence among among the "militanf Protestant groups own party and are no longer attempting the revolutionary-minded youth only by have proven to be fantasies. That is one

Intercontinental Press cause of the split The Gardiner Place leaders themselves struggle in a militaristic organization with It is possible, even likely, that the IRSP have said that republicans had to come little concqjtion of how to conduct a po- includes adventuristic elements. But the to the brink of extinction before they liticEil debate, let them show before it is role of the Stalinists and reformists in began to think. The time has come for too late that they have something better the Gardiner Place leadership also assures some rethinking. Let them open up an to offer rebel youth than Stalinism. If that many members who are looking for all-inclusive, honest discussion. If the they cannot do this, they will share the a real revolutionary alternative may be IRSP has no policies, that can be shown blame for any adventures that ensue. attracted to the IRSP. in debate. If it is not a revolutionary- The Gardiner Place leadetship still in socialist alternative^ let Gardiner Place of cludes persons who have devoted their fer a realistic revolutionary policy —al lives to their principles as they saw them. Need for Political Discussion though they cannot get this from Stalin They claimed to believe in political hon ism or from the Stalinists. esty. They know what Stalinism is, and If the leaders and the ranks of the"Offi- If there are principled revolutionists in they don't want it in Ireland. They must cieds" want to defeat adventurism, the the "Official^" who have been dragged into speak out now and offer an alternative most effective way is to speak out against an untenable position by the pressures of to both Stalinism and adventurism. □ Stalinism, reformism, and bureaucratism in their own organization. According to the concept of "democratic centralism" that is being pushed, discussion is now sup posed to be ended. But the "democratic" Amendment Seeks to Increase Restrictions decisions of the ard-fheis have not pre vented the editors of the United Irishman from trying to impose a line that the majority does not support and that casts discredit on every member of the move 600 Protest Threat to British Abortion Low ment. As a result, the leadership has lost aU "democratic" authority to restrain dis By Phyllis Hamilton and Bridget Lux cussion. It is obvious by now that "discipline?" has not solved the problems of the "Offi London tions at private clinics. These clinics, he cials." The attempt to impose untenable More than 600 persons demonstrated said, were making "excess profit^' and dogmas and build a Chinese wall against here February 7 against a bill amending may even involve "criminal gangs." what the leadership apparently regards the liberal 1967 abortion law. The The actual facts, however, have already as dangerous criticism has brought the demonstration, called by the Working been presented by the Lane Committee, organization to the brink of disaster and Women's Charter, was supported by the which reported on the abortion law in disgrace. Abortion Law Reform Association. The April 1974 eifter a three-year study. The If the Gardiner Place leadership con demonstrators called for "A Woman's committee argued that the law had tinues to combat the threat represented by Right to Choosy" and for every mother succeeded in cutting down the number of the new party in the way they have up to be a wUling mother, every child a illegal abortions. It found that the main tiR now, they run the risk of provoking wanted child. flaws of the act lay not in the influx of a process that will be far more destructive In 1967, abortions became available to women from other countries nor in the to their organization and the struggle of women on medical and social grounds, private clinics, but in the inadequacy of the Irish people than any adventure they although the final decision about a ter the facilities provided by the National might rightly fear. mination still lies with doctors and not Health Service. In some areas of the Because of their inability to find their with the woman herself. North of England and Scotland, women way forward to a consistent revolutionary Since then, the anti-abortion forces, es are still forced to go to expensive pri perspective^ the "Officials" are no longer pecially the Society for the Protection of vate clinics or to obtain illegal abortions a major force in Irish politics. They no the Unborn Child and the Society of Inno because certain doctors object on "moral" longer include anything like a majority of cents (supported by the Roman Catho grounds to performing abortions. socialist-minded activists. However, since lic church), have mounted annual pro the most extensive political experience of tests against the abortion law. But untU The Labour government refused to take the last six years has taken place in their the bill presented by James White Labour a stand in opposition to the White amend ranks, how they handle a political dis Member of Parliament for Glasgow- ment, which was sponsored by two pute in their orbit can have considerable Pollock, the threat to the law did not Labour MPs. As Margaret Coulson power of example appear serious. pointed out in the February 6 Red It does not take much imagination to White introduced a Private Member's Weekly, "the anti-abortion organisations foresee what will happen if they try to Bin to amend the law by restricting the must be very pleased that this Bill has eliminate a political opposition by excom grounds for an abortion to cases in which a Labour Sponsor —for this reinforces munications and strong-arm methods. there was "grave risk to the life or phys their efforts to portray their fight as a This is especially true if politics comes ical health of the mother." His amend non-party, non-class question." The gov to the fore in the next period as they pre ment would reduce the time limit for an ernment did not exert any pressure on dict This will almost inevitably involve abortion from twenty-eight weeks to twen MPs to vote against the bill, and the formation of a number of groupings ty weeks and require that a woman would the minister for health. Dr. David Owen, in the general republican orbit. If the have to be a resident of Britain for twenty even apologized for "abused of the abor differences cannot be resolved by political weeks before she would be eligible for tion law by the private sector and prom discussion and normal political process, an abortion. ised to introduce legislation to end them. these groupings will take the form of The main points of the amendment were He did not promise to provide adequate armed cliques, if only out of the necessity covered up by White's attacks on "abuses" abortion facilities under the National of sdf-defense. Principles will be lost. And of the abortion law. He claimed that Health Service. the practical consequences and possible women from other countries, unable The amendment was carried hy a vote results of such a development are all too to oDtaln abortions at home, were of 203 to 88, but it is not being pro obvious. flocking to Britain and obtaining abor ceeded with at present. A government rec- February 24, 1975 ommendation that the bill be referred to Immediately after the February 7 Bonn to protest against the amendment a select committee was accepted. The demonstration, at a meeting of more than to the British act, and the meeting decided committee is to deal with all the evidence 400 persons addressed by several speak to reciprocate by organising support for relating to the functioning of the abortion ers, a woman reported on the situation the right to abortion in Germany. act and Is to recommend any necessary in Europe. In France, despite some gains, amendments. This Is clearly a delaying abortion Is available only up to the tenth It is clear that the attacks on the abor tactic on the part of the Labour govern week of pregnancy, and In Italy support tion legislation must be fought, and that ment, which does not wish to alienate any ers of the right to abortion have been the 1967 act must be extended to make of Its supporters by taking a clear stand Imprisoned. In West Germany, women abortion a woman's right, not a matter on democratic rights for women. held a picket at the British Elmbassy In to be left to the discretion of a doctor. □

London Demonstration Marks 'Bloody Sunday' Massacre

Troops Out of Ireland,' Soy London Marchers By Phyllis Hamilton and Robin Hunter

The third anniversary of the massacre by some sections of the October march "The barracks," she pointed out, "are not of thirteen demonstrators by the British might have given the police a new pre far from the Catholic ghettos." British army in Derry was marked in London text to attack and victimize demonstrators. troops had no right to be in Ireland and on February 1 by a demonstration of A leaflet was distributed by the Commem should be withdrawn now. several thousand persons demanding the oration Committee urging people to co Among other speakers at the rally was immediate withdrawal of British troops operate with the march stewards and to Pat Hickey, a huUding worker and mem from Ireland. This was the second na beware of provocateurs. As it hapened, ber of the IMC. Hickey stressed the failure tional mobilization against the British oc the march was well disciplined and offered of all constitutional and repressive at cupation of Northern Ireland in a little the police no opportunity to create "in tempts to solve the Irish "problem." He more than three months. cidents." denounced the recent Gardiner Report, The action was preceded by a meeting The demonstration represented a step which while recommending that the Brit of more than 700 persons in Conway forward over last October's in that ish government improve the conditions Hall and an open-air rally at Hyde Park it clearly demanded an immediate, rather in the concentration camps in Ireland also Corner which grew to more than 1,000 than staged, withdrawal of troops, and suggests that political-prisoner status be persons. In the previous week meetings connected this with the unqualified right removed, that there he no amnesty for had been held all over Britain to publi 'of the Irish people as a whole— North political prisoners, and that internment cize and buUd the action. The February 2 and South —to determine their own future. should be retained. Observer estimated that about 4,000 per The majority of slogans reflected this: sons took part in the march. "Troops Out Now!" "Troops Out of Ire Hickey added that the "Jenkins Laws" The march was sponsored by the land, Internees Out of JaU!" "No conces could he applied to the working class in Bloody Sunday Commemoration Com sions to the Loyalists, Troops Out Now!" Britain and called for a campaign for mittee, supported by the Troops Out Slogans such as "No Exclusions, No De their repeal. He urged support for a la Movement, the International Socialists, the tentions, Smash the Jenkins Laws!" were bour movement conference on Ireland, International Marxist Croup (IMC popular with the marchers. which was seen by most speakers as one — British section of the Fourth Interna At the rally in Conway Hall the main of the major steps to be taken in the tional), and others. speaker was Bernadette McAliskey of the campaign. This was the first major public protest newly formed Irish Socialist Republican Most of those at the rally then attended against British policy on Ireland since party. She recalled the events leading up the demonstration. Among those partici the repressive legislation introduced by to the 1972 Civil Rights March that cul pating were the Troops Out Movement; the Labour home secretary, Roy Jenkins. minated In the "Bloody Sunday" massacre. the IMC, which had the largest organised The "Jenkins Laws" extend the state's She claimed that the main lesson to be contingent; People's Democracy; the Inter power to detain, interrogate, and in the learnt was that the British ruling class national Socialists; the British Withdrawal case of foreign residents, expel from Brit had proved itself to be willing to murder from Northern Ireland Campaign (a ain those suspected of "terrorism." It ap civil rights demonstrators. She called for pacifist grouping currently under prosecu plies to those suspected of giving even the Immediate withdrawal of British tion for "conspiracy to disaffection" — spe moral support to alleged terrorists. This troops and attacked the "bloodbath" cifically, leafleting British soldiers on their demonstration was slightly larger than the theory that if British troops were with rights), and a wide variety of other action held in October 1974 (prior to drawn immediately there would be civU groups. the legislation), and demanded the repeal war and mass murder in Ireland. She Perhaps as significant as those who at of the "Jenkins Laws." argued that British troops were buttress tended is the list of political organisations Incidents of provocation had provided ing the Protestants and said only if the that stayed away. Most notable was the a pretext for police attacks and arrests troops were withdrawn would it he pos absence of the British Communist party at the October demonstration (see Inter sible to win over a section of the Protes and its co-thinkers of the British Peace continental Press, November II, 1974, tants to republican and socialist ideas. Committee, who participated in the last p. 1465), and in the new legal context McAliskey singled out for attack the mobUizatioa The Communist party is not the situation was considered extremely position of the Communist party and cer willing to risk its working relationship delicate by the march organisers. Slogans tain "leff Social Democrats, who call for with the "leff of the Labour party and that expressed solidarity with the Irish the withdrawal of troops to barracks and the trade-union bureaucracy by calling Republican Army, then legal, and chanted for a phased withdrawal from Ireland. for immediate withdrawal of troops.

Intercontinental Press Also absent was the Labour party Young Socialists, a group very much Victims of Lisbon's 'Scorched Earth' Campaign under the influence of the ex-Trotskyist Militant grouping. This tendency ignores the existence of the national question in Ireland and puts forward the abstract Thousands Face Famine in Mozambique demand for Catholic and Protestant work ing-class unity. There were no Labour party constitu Severe hunger has become a serious to Pachinuapa, they have since been liv ency association banners at the mobiliza threat in the Cabo Delgado district of ing from wild fruits and nuts, which are tion, and unlike the October 1974 demon northern Mozambique, according to a expected to come to a seasonal end in stration, not a single Labour party Mem report by James MacManus in the Febru March. ber of Parliament participated and called ary 8 Manchester Guardian. A prelim "We simply cannot begin to count instan for immediate withdrawal. Not even the inary assessment carried out by the ces of this sort," he continued. "The terri would-be-radical TWhurae grouping. Frelimo (Frente de Libertacao de Mocam- tory is swarming with people who have Despite the absence of these forces, the bique —Mozambique Liberation Front) been removed from their homes and land administration in the district estimated size and militancy of the Bloody Sunday and have suddenly been cut off from all that about 35,000 African villagers were supplies." □ Commemoration demonstration indicates close to the primary stages of famine and that the movement for the withdrawal of that food supplies were running out for troops is gaining momentum. As the Jan uary 30 Red Weekly said, "the British 80,000 more. FBI Engaged In Snooping Abroad working class has to be won to opposi There are no civilian doctors in the region and only one Portuguese medical Recent revelations about Central Intel tion to any handover to the loyalists, orderly is stationed in the district capi ligence Agency spying on U. S. citizens for troops out now, and for self-deter tal of Porto Amelia. He is scheduled to inside the United States have now been mination for the Irish people." □ leave Mozambique in March. Freiimo offi supplemented by reports that the Federal cials in the area believe that such diseases Bureau of Investigation, Washington's as conjunctivitis and dysentery are grow domestic snooping agency, carries out in ing to epidemic proportions. telligence-gathering missions outside the United States. Portuguese Peasants Seize Estates The dangerous conditions in Cabo Dei- gado, MacManus notes, were the result The February 16 New York Times re Thousands of landless Portuguese peas of the ten-year war Lisbon carried out in ported that Joseph Burton, a 42-year-old ants in the Alentejo region attended a its effort to crush the liberation forces. FBI informant from Tampa, Florida, conference in Evora February 9 to dis Frelimo first began its operations in the posed as a Marxist for more than two cuss land reform. The conference was district in 1964, and the Portuguese years in order to infiltrate Maoist circles sponsored by the Communist party. army, in its drive to destroy Frelimo's in the United States and abroad. Burton Alvaro Cunhal, CP general secretary base of support, slaughtered cattle, na- told the Times that he had made "about and a cabinet minister in the Portuguese palmed villages, and burned crops. Using 10" visits to Canada at the FBI's di government, addressed the crowd of about the "scorched earth" policy, the colonialist rection. 12,000 persons. When they began to chant forces devastated wide areas of the coun An FBI spokesman in Washington con demands for immediate expropriation of tryside. firmed in an interview with the Times the large estates in the region, Cunhal Raimundo Pachinuapa, the Freiimo dis that the bureau has sent U. S. citizens replied that they would have to wait. "But trict governor, told MacManus, "The war abroad to spy. you'll have it soon enough," he promised. we fought was a necessary one but it has Burton headed a fake "revolutionary" A week earlier, the minister of agricul destroyed a great deal. The situation is group in Tampa called the "Red Star ture told Alentejo farm workers that the desperate We are at zero in terms of food Cadrd' that the FBI asked him to set up provisional government had plans to ex and supply. In the liberated areas, which as a front for his work. propriate arable lands currently not in we have controlled for years, the people According to the New York Times, his use. have something. But in the Portuguese instructions were "to develop contacts with The peasants, eager for land reform, zones there is nothing, little land under members of the Canadian Communist are apparently not waiting. During early cultivation, and no livestock. party's pro-Chinese wing, and to report Fdaruary, they seized at least three estates to the F. B. I. on their activities, including owned by absentee landlords. "Even in the liberated zones the situation any signs that the organization was pass In some cases peasants armed with shot is bad. We no longer get food and medi ing funds from China to Maoist groups guns patrolled the seized properties. Land cal supplies from Tanzania direct—every in the United States." lords who do not take care of their live thing has to come from the South. There It is possible that Burton and the Times stock, machinery, and property have been is hardly any transport because the Portu are referring to one or more of the denounced by the peasants for their eco guese smashed everything in their mili various Maoist groups that exist in nomic sabotage. tary camps before leaving, even the win Canada. The Communist party in that About 40 percent of Portugal's popula dows of their barracks." country is not known to have had a "pro- tion of 9.2 million is engaged in agri Much of the problem in Cabo Delgado, Chinese wing" for several years. It is culture. Pachinuapa said, had been caused by the characterized by slavish adherence to Portuguese practice during the war of for Moscow's line. cibly herding African peasants into "for Burton boasted he had caused a "riff Too Close to Home? tified villages," where they became depen among some of the organizations repre The San Juan Star in Puerto Rico gave dent on the Portuguese fo: food. He cited sented at a Maoist conference in Canada. a mixed review to Costa Gavras's film the case of 600 villagers from Mueda A former "high official" of the FBI told State of Siege, which deals with U. S. coun who had been shipped to a camp on the the New York Times that the bureau terrevolutionary activity in Latin Amer island of Ibo off Mozambique's coast. maintains agents in a number of foreign ica: "The plot, photography, suspense^ After the April 25 Lisbon coup, the vil capitals. He said they serve as "legal at and characters are fine; but the political lagers were hauled back to central Cabo taches" and have their offices inside U. S. theme often detracts." Delgado to fend for themselves. According embassies. February 24, 1975 'Covert Action' by the White House could become the object of CIA atten tion—and possible military interven- ^ tion. The new disclosures about Tru Reveal Truman Readied Troops in 1948 man's role in the 1948 Italian election sustain what revolutionary socialists to Block Electoral Victory of Italian CP said at the time. "Rarely has there been so brazen By Dick Fidler an attempt by a foreign power to in terfere with an election in another country," Art Preis wrote in the March President Harry S. Truman author versity history professor, who is chair 22, 1948, issue of The Militant, the ized the use of "covert action," includ man of the advisory committee, told U.S. socialist newsweekly. ing military intervention, to prevent the Times that "the National Security a victory of the Communist-Socialist Council is being very sticky about The Militant described the various means employed by the Truman ad alliance in Italy's 1948 election, ac releasing documents." ministration to pressure Italian voters cording to documents just published The documents published by the into rejecting the workers parties and by the State Department. State Department do not indicate what backing capitalism. The documents, a censored version role was played by the newly formed of National Security Council reports, Central Intelligence Agency in carry Secretary of State George C. Mar reveal that Truman approved a se ing out Truman's recommendations. shall threatened to cut off Economic cret recommendation that the United But in the January issue of Foreign Recovery Program assistance (the States "make full use of its political, Affairs quarterly, Harry Rositzke, a Marshall Plan) to Italy if its people economic, and if necessary, military former CIA official, said that "in 1948, (in his words) "choose to vote into power" to help the pro-U.S. govern spurred by the Communist takeover in power a government in which the ment of Premier Alcide de Gasperi Czechoslovakia and the Italian politi dominant political force would be a turn back the Communists in the April cal crisis, the National Security party whose hostility to this program 18, 1948, election. Council gave the CIA the responsi has been frequently enunciated. . . ." The documents are part of the series bility for 'political, psychological, eco The U.S. Justice Department de "The Foreign Relations of the United nomic, and unconventional warfare clared that "Italians who join the Com States." The contain many deletions. operations'. .. . " munist party never will be permitted The February 12 New York Times to immigrate to the United States"— a provided some examples: These revelations come at a time serious threat when many thousands "One report, dated Feb. 10, 1948, when the Italian Communist party, of Italians were forced by the extreme lists eight recommendations. The fifth, encouraged by the widening fissures poverty of their native country to ending with a deletion, says: 'Active developing within the ruling Christian move to the United States. ly combatting communist propaganda Democratic party, is stepping up its The Militant of March 22, 1948, in Italy by an effective U.S. informa efforts to get back into the govern reported that "a great naval armada tion program and by all other practi ment It was kicked out of the coali has been concentrated around Italy's cable means [rest of sentence deleted].' tion government in 1947 under pres coastal waters, numerous naval "Another report, dated March 8, rec sure from Washington. 'games' have been held in the Medi ommends 'efforts by all feasible means Only a few months ago, the Ford terranean and American naval planes [deletion] to detach the Italian left- administration indicated that it is quite have repeatedly flown over Milan, wing Socialists from the Communists.' prepared to repeat Truman's example Turin and other major industrial cities "The same report recommends, with of military and economic blackmail of Italy." an additional deletion: 'Continue to and covert operations to thwart such Besides shaking the big stick, the assist the Christian Democrats and a development. threat of military action, Washington other selected anti-Communist parties When Kissinger met with congres offered a carrot. About $4 million [deletion].'" sional leaders in September 1974 to was reported to have been potired The State Department declined to defend CIA activities, "he reportedly into Italy by the U.S. government discuss with the news media what had defended the need for covert activity to swing the vote. The biggest election been deleted. But the New York Times by asserting that despite criticism of bribe, however, was the announcement reported that William M. Franklin, the C.I.A., if Italy went Communist, on March 20, 1948, that if the Italians director of the State Department's His there would be criticism that the voted for a right-wing government, torical Office, had told members of United States had not done enough to the United States, Britain, and France the department's outside advisory save her," New York Times corres would favor restoration of the terri panel on the foreign relations series: pondent Bernard Gwertzman wrote tory of Trieste to Italy. At the same "It has been agreed that we cannot September 27. time, "unusually reliable diplomatic cover in the foreign relations series Similarly, Ford's explicit defense of sources" in Washington broadcast the clandestine operations, covert intelli Washington's "right" to intervene in promise that some of Italy's former gence reports or any matters having the internal politics of other countries, African colonies might likewise be re to do with secret weapons or nuclear as in the case of the CIA's clandestine turned. programs other than those that could operations against the Allende govern The Truman administration's public be specifically declassified." ment in Chile, was a public warning declarations were carefully synchro Walter F. Lafeber, a Cornell Uni that other countries, including Italy, nized with a fierce right-wing cam-

Intercontinental Press paign inside Italy led by the Christian overthrow of Chile's Popular Unity They indicate the need to open up Democrats and the Roman Catholic government aroused widespread in an investigation of the CIA's covert hierarchy. The Vatican announced dignation. The new documents pub activity, to expose the entire record that it had instructed the clergy to lished by the State Department show of U.S. imperialism's secret interven refuse absolution to professed Com that such policies go back at least tion in the internal politics of coun munists—including, presumably, any a quarter of a century. tries around the world. □ one who voted Communist. The de Gasperi regime paraded tens of thou sands of troops bristiing with Gain Cost-of-Llving Allowance U. S.-made weapons. Fascist gangs swarmed the streets, attacking work ers meetings. Labor leaders were kid napped and assassinated. "This formidable array of capitalist Indian Dock Workers Win Portia! Victory force," the Aprii 19 Militant stated in By Sharad Jhaveri an editoriai headed "Hands Off Itaiy!" is 'based on far more than the internai resources of Itaiian capitaiism which Jamnagar real increase in dock workers' bene is utterly decayed, bankrupt and dis The four-day strike by dock work fits wiii be small. The union leaders credited. The funds, the arms, the ma ers ended January 19 when the re also accepted the authority of the gov terial means of power come from a gime of Prime Minister Indira Gan ernment-appointed wage revision com foreign source—the United States." dhi conceded some of the strikers' mittee, in which the union has no The documents just released in dem ands. voice. Washington confirm the truth of this The All-India Port and Dock Work The regime's efforts to end the strike charge. ers Federation launched the strike on differ from its brutal suppression of De Gasperi's Christian Democratic January 16 after rejecting the regime's the May 1974 railway strike. Al party won the April 18, 1948, election offer of only 25 rupeesi a month as though the Defence of India Rules were with 48 percent of the vote, an in interim dearness [cost-of-iiving] al invoked and the army was alerted, crease of about 13 percent over its lowance for 1974. The strikers had no arrests of striking workers or vote in the previous election in 1946. initially demanded Rs. 100 a month union leaders were made. In contrast The Staiinist-dominated electoral bloc as dearness allowance from January to its approach during the railway received just under 31 percent—about 1974, a revision of the wage struc strike, the regime continued to nego the same as the combined CP and ture through bipartite negotiations, tiate with the dockers, even after the SP vote in 1946. and ranking as industrial workers. strike was launched. The election results established the [See Intercontinental Press, Feb The regime's approach may have Christian Democrats as the major par ruary 3, p. 150.] been influenced by the fact that three liamentary party in Itaiy. They no The agreement ending the strike sets of the union's leaders, Manohar Kot- longer needed to rely on coalition with a dearness allowance of Rs. 120 for wal, H. N. Trivedi, and Shanti Patel, the Stalinists to maintain capitalist the period January to July 1974 and are members of the ruling Congress order and private property. Rs. 180 from July to December. The party. The HMS, AITUC, and workers are to be paid Rs. 50 a month INTUC3 helped keep the strike with The Communist and Socialist party in dearness allowance beginning Jan in safe channels. leaders had helped pave the way for uary 1, 1975. This interim relief will Nevertheless, the strike settlement the resurgence of reaction by their be subject to the provisions of the Ad will cost the Finance Ministry about whole policy of coalition with the ditional Emoluments (Compulsory Rs. 8 crores-4 for 1974 and an addi Deposits) Act, 1974.2 Any increase Christian Democrats and other bour tional Rs. 16 crores annually from geois parties. In government, they had in wages, which is now under con January 1975. Moreover, large reve played a crucial role in stabilizing sideration by the wage revision com nue losses were reported in some Itaiian capitalism in the aftermath mittee, will be retroactive from Jan ports. About 175 ships were stranded of the fascists' overthrow —disarming uary 1, 1974. during the strike, resulting in a loss the workers, opposing strikes, and The leaders of the port and dock of Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 20,000 a day calling for social peace. workers thus submitted to the Gandhi for each ship. If the strike had con Washington's intervention, however, regime's wage freeze act. Because of tinued, shipping operations would growing inflation, this means that the was no doubt instrumental in refur have been seriously disrupted. □ bishing the discredited bourgeois pol iticians, former collaborators of the 1. One rupee is equivalent to US$0,127. 3. Hind Mazdoor Sabha, a trade-union hated fascist regime, who built the — IP federation organized by the Praja Social Christian Democracy into the formid ist party; Ail-India Trade Union Con able right-wing political machine that 2. Under this law, which was enacted gress, whose head is S. A. Dange; gen has dominated Italy's governments July 6, 1974, all wage increases for one eral secretary of the Communist party year and 50 percent of all cost-of-iiving of India; Indian National Trade Union for almost thirty years. allowance increases for two years are to Congress, dominated by the Congress The recent revelations about the role be impounded in compulsory "savings" party. — TP of covert CIA action in attempts to accounts, to be paid back in five annual prevent Allende's election and in the installments. — IP 4. One crore equals ten mUiion units. — IP February 24, 1975 Prelude to Further Escalation In Cambodia? contingency plaa But the full consequences of such a mas sive airlift have been carefully avoided by Pentagon and U. S. embassy spokes Pentagon Doubles Airlift to Lon Nol men. Rockets regularly hit Pnompenh's air port, and each flight in and out is a By Peter Green dangerous business. According to the February 12 Washington Post, U.S. dip The Pentagon took another step toward lomatic sources in Pnompenh "concede open intervention once again in the Indo that an airlift of the size of that to Berlin china war when it doubled its airlift of after World War 11 is completely out of supplies to the Lon Nol regime February the question, because of the war situation 15. in Cambodia and the lack of protection The Khmer Rouge insurgents have now against antiaircraft weapons." virtually blockaded the Mekong River, If the Pentagon goes ahead with its Pnompenh's main supply line. For the planned full-scale airlift, which it seems first time in the war, they have mined to be building up to, then it would also the river. They have also stepped up have to step up its mUitary intervention. heavy artillery fire from the banks, which In a familiar scenario, the Pentagon are almost totally under their control. would argue that to protect the lives of The February 10 New York Times re its pilots, be they "civOian" or military, ported that nineteen supply vessels were the insurgent positions from which rockets sunk in the previous ten days. Shipping \ are launched against the airport have to sources cited by the February 16 Wash be attacked, or that the aircraft have to ington Post said that crews have now be defended against antiaircraft fire. refused to take cargo ships or barges If the Mekong remains blockaded, such up the river, despite offers of 300 per an airlift is thought to be the only way cent wage bonuses. Washington could forestall the collapse Support from Washington is all that of Lon Nol in the near futura A U. S. has sustained Lon Nol up till now.. As embassy official quoted by the February his regime crumbles and his armed forces 10 New York Times said that ammuni become less and less effective in holding tion supplies were down to a "dangerous" back the popular rebellion. White House LON NOL More isolated than ever. level. He added: "If the river stays closed strategists face a difficult problem: In the for another two weeks and we don't get face of overwhelming opposition from the additional supplies by airlift, it would be American people, and even from much of This would amount to a maximum ca a lot more than dangerous. It would be Congress, how can Lon Nol be saved? pacity of 360 tons of supplies daily, critical." The Pentagon has sought to disguise mainly ammunition, representing about Fuel and food are also running short. the extent of U. S. involvement. In October two-thirds of Lon Nol's current ammuni Pnompenh's power supply has been cut last year the air force turned over the tion consumption. by at least two-thirds and gasoline has work of supplying Lon Nol by air from WhEe Bird Air was organizing the extra been rationed. Rice is also now being Thailand to a civilian contractor, Bird pUots and crew for the new planes, the rationed, causing the black market price Air. According to the February 12 IFas/i- Pentagon itself rented three extralarge to surge. ington Post, this was to avoid going over DC-8 "stretch" cargo jets, each with a The U. S. embassy has ordered the de the ceiling imposed by Congress of 200 capacity of forty-five tons and capable pendents of embassy staff members to U.S. officials in Cambodia at any one of making two trips a day. These planes leave the city. The embassy also advised time. The Pentagon supplied Bird Air began operations February 15. other U. S. citizens and foreigners work free of charge with five C-130 transport ing for the U. S. government to evacuate planes —with their insignias painted out. To keep the city supplied with fuel and dependents and other nonessential per Half the Bird Air pilots are "retired" U. S. food as well as ammunition, Washington sonnel. The Australian, British, French, Air Force men; the rest are active re would have to organize a much larger Japanese, and South Vietnamese have all servists. airlift. The U. S. embassy in Pnompenh made similar evacuation moves. The Washington Post pointed out that announced January 16 that it had an An embassy spokesman said the depen Bird Air had "long-time connections with emergency contingency plan for such an dents were leaving not because of the the Pentagon as well as peripheral con airlift, but only "as a last resort." How danger, but because living conditions had tacts with the Central Intelligence Agency." ever, the contingency plan may already grown worse. The U. S. press also at This "peripheral" contact included a large be in effect. Part of the plan may have tempted to put the evacuation in this light. supply operation in the early 1960s been for the airlift to be increased grad "Despite the shellings and the blockade," during the CIA's secret war in Laos, ually, gauging public reaction at each the February 16 Washington Post re which involved training and equipping stage. ported, "there is no panic here among the more than 20,000 Meo hUl tribesmen as The commander of U. S. forces in the Cambodians or the foreigners, and send mercenaries. Pacific, Admiral Noel Gaylor, visited ing the dependents out of the country When the Mekong River supply line was Pnompenh on February 13 to assess the has become similar to sending the wives first threatened in early January, Bird blockade and the level of mUitary sup and chUdren to a cool mountain vacation Air stepped up its operations from be plies. He met with Lon Nol and the com retreat in the hot season, as was the prac tween two to five flights daily to ten. On mander of Pnompenh's armed forces. tice in the colonial era." February 11, the Pentagon announced Lieutenant General Sosthene Fernandez. The Pentagon and the U.S. embassy that Bird Air would be given another six According to a report in the February 15 are in an awkward position. The must or seven C-130s, allowing a total of New York Times, one topic presumably downplay the seriousness of the situation twenty-two to twenty-four flights a day. on the agenda was the U. S. "last resorf in Pnompenh to prevent any panic there

Intercontinental Press but must play up the danger before Con Times, Ford wants another $425 million military budget might be intended to fi gress in an attempt to get increased finan in military aid for the next fiscal year nance an escalation of the war, not merely cial support for the war. This has led to as well. to continue expenditure at its present some contradictory statements. As recently Another possibility is that the expanded level. □ as January 7, Sydney H. Schanberg re ported in the February 7 New York Times, a senior U.S. embassy official in Pnompenh, when asked during a "deep Threatened With Tax Suit, Eviction background" meeting with a newsman if the aid cut by Congress in December had created a critical situation, replied: "I don't think we're in trouble. They're just going Russell Foundation Under Attack in Britain to have to be more careful in how they use their resources." The Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation* our favour. The Revenue admit that they After President Ford asked Congress has made an urgent appeal for help in have chosen to move against us as a on January 28 for an extra $222 mil the fight to prevent British authorities test case, in order to reverse the prece lion in military aid for Pnompenh, Am from pressing a very high tax claim dents of judge-made law which govern bassador John Gunther Dean said that against the foundation. At the same time, the matter in question. . . . They have without the supplemental funds the Cam the organization faces an attempt by the also refused to underwrite any of the le bodian army would run out of ammuni local Nottingham Council to carry gal costs which this decision imposes on tion long before the end of the fiscal year. through an order enabling it to demolish us. . . . The legal costs involved in this "It is not an exaggeration to say that the foundation's printing shop and as enormous litigation could be prodigious. this is a matter of survival for the non- sociated offices. "As if this were not enough, the local Communist side in this war," he asserted. The foundation, established by the late council has simultaneously decided to is Asked to explain the discrepancy, the Bertrand Russell, is active in defending sue a compulsory purchase order to en embassy said that there had been "a lot political prisoners in countries around the able it to demolish our printing factory of confusion" and "conflicting views" world. In 1967 internationally known ex and all our extensive associated offices." among embassy officials. Schanberg re perts testified at its tribunal on U.S. war The foundation estimates that it will ported that the embassy blamed two un crimes in Vietnam. need a minimum of 30,000 pounds to expected developments for the change: in Since Russell's death in 1970 the insure the continuation of its work. □ creased costs and the intensity of the insur foundation has branched out to establish gents' offensive. "However," he continued, its own printing press, which provides Pakistani Regime Bans Opposition Party "the embassy had predicted the offen facilities for a large number of trade- sive— one is mounted every dry sea union, civil-liberties, socialist, radical, and Following the February 8 assassina son— and the fighting, according to the women's organizations. It also founded tion of Hyat Mohammad Khan Sherpao, embassy's assessments, is no more intense a publishing house that has produced home minister of the North-West Frontier than last year." An article by Mike Snitow- more than 100 pamphlets and several Province, the Pakistani regime banned the sky in the January 24 Far Eastern Eco dozen books in the recent past. opposition National Awami party and nomic Review reported that this year, "the In April 1974 the foundation opened arrested up to 400 leaders of the NAP normal ferocity of [the Khmer Rouge's] a new tribunal —to deal with the system and other political groups. Among the dry-season offensive has given way to a atic violation of human rights in Latin arrested were NAP President Khan Ab strategy of apprehensive caution." America. A central focus of the testimony dul Wall Khan. Schanberg reported that military ana was U.S. complicity in the overthrow of The order outlawing the NAP also de lysts in Pnompenh maintain that the trend the Allende regime in Chile. creed that the party's funds and proper in ammunition costs was visible when The foundation receives a large num ties would be confiscated by the govern the original request was prepared. The ber of requests for assistance and inter ment. On February 10, the National embassy also insisted that transportation vention on behalf of political prisoners Assembly passed a law withdrawing im costs must now come out of the military in every part of the world. If the attack munity from arrest of members of the aid budget rather than from a special by the tax authorities goes unchecked, assembly, the Senate, and provincial leg Pentagon budget. Schanberg pointed out the organizations's ability to respond to islative assembles. that this "raised another question of credi these appeals may be gravely hampered. Prime Minister Zulfikar Alt Bhutto said, bility. Since the beginning of the war the In a recent letter, foundation directors "The time has come that all politics of embassy has told newsmen that shipping Ken Coates and Chris Farley stress the violence with its tentacles abroad should costs were included; now it would appear seriousness of the threat be ended in order to save the country. that tens of millions of dollars were dis ". . . we now face a double crisis, which "We have to think seriously that it is guised in the Defense Department's budget poses a risk that we may be put out of necessary to save Pakistan for all times so that the real total of aid to Cambodia action for an uncomfortably long time. to come from secession and threat of se has never been given to the public." Firstly, the Inland Revenue are insisting cession and to put an end to the poli Schanberg reported that Ford's supple on pressing a very high tax claim against tics of violence and bloodshed." mental request is believed to be more than us relating, as we feel, unjustly, to money The NAP was founded in 1957 by Pnompenh needs for this fiscal year. It given by Betrand Russell and expended Maulana Bhashani, a peasant leader in would make the military budget the big in connection with the Tribunal on War East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). In 1972 gest of the Cambodian war: Crimes in Vietnam. We had made care and 1973, leaders of the NAP held of "The analysts feel that this raises serious ful allowance to meet all due tax pay fice in Baluchistan and the North-West questions whether the Ford Administration ments and this case is being pressed Frontier Province, where the Baluchis and is trying to establish a buffer arms even though the Special Commissioners Pathans have been fighting for autonomy stock for next year, when a war-weary whose function is to adjudicate such from the central government. In the past, Congress can be expected to provide even claims, have already decisively found in some of the NAP leaders supported the less aid to Indochina than this year." autonomy demand. The Bhutto regime In fact, Anthony Lewis disclosed in a *Bertrand Russell House, Gamble Street, frequently charged the NAP with aiding column in the February 6 New York Nottingham NG7 4ET, England. the Baluchi and Pathan guerrillas.

February 24, 1975 Hard Hit by Loyoffs, Inflation

Belgian Workers Combat Advancing Recession By Marcel Smet

Brussels against inflation. For several years menf^ with the demands for 1975-76 The recession that began In Belgium all governments have appealed for and the agreement that was actually in early autumni has deepened since "moderation." But these appeals have reached.8 then. By December 31, 1974, there fallen on deaf ears. were 250,000 unemployed, including At the end of October the govern Previous Agreement (1973-74) 140,000 completely unemployed and ment tried a new step toward an in 110,000 partially unemployed. The comes policy. The minister of econom 1. The demand for a minimum wage rate of fully unemployed is 5.4%. The ic affairs announced in parliament of 12,500 francs [1 franc equals main victims of the recession are wom "that he would not hesitate to take US$0,028] was rejected. en (with an unemployment rate of measures against wage increases that 2. A 40-hour workweek by January 8.9% compared with 3.8% for men) overstep the increase in the consumer 1, 1976, at the latest, with the 42- and youth (one-third of the unem price index and the growth of pro hour workweek in 1973 and the 41- ployed are under 25 years of age).^ ductivity."5 Officially, wage increases hour week in 1974 as intermediary Another indicator: During the last are to be held to a ceiling of 4%. stages. two months of 1974, the use of electri To meet the growing discontent in 3. The issue of transportation costs city in Belgium was no greater than the labor movement over unemploy to and from work was referred to in the corresponding months of 1973.3 ment, the government decided Decem settlement at the level of sectors and The Ministry of Economic Affairs does ber 15 to take steps to ease the un individual plants. not exclude the possibility of a decline employment resulting from its anti- 4. Four weeks of paid holidays be in the gross national product during inflationary policy. Twenty thousand ginning in 1975. From 1973 on, this the first quarter of 1975. unemployed will be hired by the state, fourth week would be paid as a nor Inflation continues to mount side and 100% of the public investments mal workweek in the firm. by side with the recession. With a allocations will be spent in 1975, as 5. Pensions: The 1971 agreement rate of 15.7% for retail prices and compared with 80% in 1974. This was reaffirmed. of 23.7% for wholesale prices,4 in "phase two" will be followed by a flation is much higher than in France, "phase three" of economic recovery 1975-76 Demands West Germany, and Holland, the main once inflation has been contained. trading partners of Belgium. This 1. A guaranteed minimum wage of threatens the latter's competitive posi The Interprofessional Agreement 15,500 francs (gross) beginning Jan tion. uary 1, 1975. Despite the high rate of unemploy For workers whose jobs and pur 2. A legal guarantee of the 40-hour ment, the coalition government of the chasing power are threatened, the In workweek. PSC, PLP, and RW (Parti Social terprofessional Agreements has taken 3. Free transportation to and from Chretien— Social Christian party; on very great importance. The prepar work. Parti pour la Libert^ et le Progres—the ations for negotiations showed a 4. Gradual introduction of double Liberal party; and the Rassemblement growing radicalization in the FGTB vacation pay for the fourth week of Wallon—Walloon Rally) has made (F6d6ration G6n6rale des Travailleurs holidays. fighting inflation its number one ob de Belgique— Belgian General Feder 5. Lowering of the retirement age jective in an effort to strengthen the ation of Workers, the Social Democrat after 45 years' work for men, 40 position of Belgian capitalism on the ic union), with several union centers years' work for women. European market. Since the capitalists declaring in favor of a twenty-four- 6. Equal pay for equal work by have no intention of cutting into their hour general strike to back their de women and youth. profits, the workers are made to mands. But in spite of all this, the shoulder the cost of the struggle leaderships of the FGTB and the CSC Agreement Accepted by Unions (Confederation Syndicate Chretienne— 1. See "For Belgium, Too, No Escape Confederation of Christian Unions) 1. No agreement on the minimum From Recession," by Ernest Mandd, In succeeded in imposing on their ranks wage. tercontinental Press, November 11, 1974, a very moderate program of demands 2. A 40-hour workweek protected by p. 1475. and an even worse final agreement. law by the end of 1975. Let us compare the 1973-74 agree- 3. The bosses to pay 50% of public 2. Figures from the National Employ ment Bureau. 5. De Standaard, October 24, 1974. 7. Rood, Vol. 6, No. 45. 3. La Libre Belgique, January 9, 1975. 6. A national contract that applies to all 8. De Volksmachi (organ of the CSC), 4. Affaires Economiques. private companies. December 28, 1974. Intercontinental Press transportation to and from work. ent unable to impose a real incomes manding a complete freeze on prices Wage increase to cover group fares. policy. and wages—in practice, a deflation A recommendation to include all The example in the oil industry can ary policy that would include a sig means of transportation in this con give rise to hard-fought struggles in nificant growth in unemployment. But tract. the steel and metal products sectors, the workers' reactions to the closure 4. Two days of the fourth week of where negotiations have broken off of Glaverbel-Gilly has already dem holidays to be paid at double time. and where— in contrast to the oil in onstrated the great dangers such a 5. A pension at 64 years of age dustry— the employers do not rake in policy would entail for thebourgeoisie. after 45 years of work. A prepension extraordinary profits and will not The PSB (Parti Socialiste Beige—Bel at 60 for men, and 55 for women, for concede significant increases simply gian Socialist party) calls for the im workers laid off. through negotiations. mediate application of a plan of eco 6. A recommendation that interna nomic recovery. This would inevitably tional conventions against discrimina lead to a new surge of prices even tion with respect to women and youth Glass Industry: The Struggle greater than that of 1974. be applied. Agreement to pay full Against Unemployment Neither the government's policy nor wages to youth after they have After having already laid off almost the proposals of the VU or the PSB reached 21 years of age. 1,000 workers at the end of 1974, the offer any guarantees to the workers, As can be seen, the agreement of multinational trust BSN-Glaverbel de because they do not strike at the cap fers the workers no guarantees to re cided to close its factory at Gilly (near italist system. That is why the RAL- tain their jobs and their purchasing Charleroi). The jobs of 600 workers LRT (Revolutionaire Arbeiders Liga- power. Unemployment will continue in the glass-manufacturing plant are Ligue R^volutionnaire des Travail- and inflation will mount again as directly threatened, and the jobs of leurs — Revolutionary Workers soon as the government turns to a pol 4,000 others in associated industries League, Belgian section of the Fourth icy of recovery. are indirectly jeopardized. This has International) puts forward concrete created a problem affecting the whole demands that can be the point of de Incomes Policy Defeated region around Charleroi, which al parture for anticapitalist struggles: ready has one of the highest rates of While the Interprofessional Agree unemployment in the country. Against unemployment: ment is one of the most barren in The workers at GiUy, where there •A 35-hour week without reduction years, this does not mean that the exists a significant "Gauche Syndicate" in pay. bourgeoisie has a clear road ahead [Trade-Union Left Wing] with a mili •Retirement at 60, at a pension of it The most significant evidence tant trade-union line, have reacted in equivalent to 75% of the wage earned of this is that its incomes policy is an exemplary way. They immediately in the five best years. not succeeding. organized a twenty-four-hour strike •Workers control over state sub sidies. The oil workers have forced the big and a street demonstration. All deci gest breach in it. They demanded an sions were made in general assemblies increase of 20 francs an hour, while of the workers. They organized soli In defense of pmrchasing power; the bosses refused to concede more darity demonstrations and got in con •A minimum wage of 15,500 than 5 to 6 francs. The union issued tact with the works at Zeebrugge and francs. a strike warning that was to expire the other glass factories. On Jan •Linking the taxation scale to a on January 20. Given the strategic uary 16 the workers occupied the head cost-of-living index. •Automatic and immediate adjust and economic importance of this sec office of Glaverbel in Brussels. The ments in wages linked to rises in the tor and the great combativity and Charleroi FGTB was to hold a special tradition of advanced forms of strug congress on January 21. Directly cost of living. gle of the workers (for example, oc threatened by the decline in employ •Struggle against tax evasion. cupations) a strike in the oil industry ment in the region, the union lead •Nationalization under workers would have been a real accelerator ers are taking a fairly militant stance. control of the oil industry, the energy for the class struggle in Belgium. sector, the banks, and credit corpora At the time of writing, a prelim Government Responsibility tions. inary agreement— the details have not January 17, 1975 been revealed —has been reached in In this rather tense social climate, Antwerp, where two-thirds of the oil the government is trying to steer a workers are employed. The strike course between the twin evils of in warning has been postponed, and a flation and unemployment. But it U.S. Military Experts Aiding Saigon strike appears less probable. hasn't succeeded in getting rid of eith But in any event, even if the 10 er. As a result the working class is en The Defense Department admitted Feb francs hourly increase proposed by gaging in many struggles both to pre ruary 7 that seventeen U. 8. Air Force the Petroleum Federation and advo serve its purchasing power and to technical experts were in South Vietnam cated by the union leaderships to the save its jobs. helping to distribute aircraft parts for the rank and file amounts to only 50% The main opposition parties have Saigon Air Force. A spokesman denied, however, that their presence was a vio of the initial demand, it already goes centered their fire almost exclusively far beyond the 4% recommended by lation of the Paris accords, which pro on one or the other of the two prob hibit the introduction of "troops, military the government and the employers. lems. The VU (Volksunie, a right- advisers and military personnel, including The Belgian bourgeoisie is at pres- wing Flemish nationalist party) is de technical military persoimel." February 24, 1975 Vows to Fight 'Twenty or Even Thirty Years'

George Habash Scores Palestinian 'Ministate' Deal

Not all Palestinian resistance orga to the United Nations with observer nizations accepted the October 28, status are in reality trying to bribe 1974, decision by Arab heads of state, us, to draw us into a path of capit meeting in Rabat, Morocco, to support ulation. the creation of an independent Pales mm \ tinian authority "on any Palestinian Le Monde: In his speech to the Gen land that is liberated" from Israeli eral Assembly, however, Yasir Arafat occupation, and to recognize the Pal said nothing that might be interpreted estine Liberation Organization as the as a capitulation. 'Isole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people." Habash: That is true, but only in Among those opposed to the Rabat appearance. The essential thing is not conference decision was the Popular what he says, but what he is inclined Front for the Liberation of Palestine. to do. He is prepared not only to set The PFLP withdrew from the PLO tle for a part of Palestine, but also to Executive Committee in September attend the peace conference in Geneva. 1974, just before the Rabat conference, It bears repeating, however, that the but continues to remain a part of the present conjuncture will not permit the umbreUa grouping. formation of a state that can serve The leader of the PFLP, Dr. George as a base for continuing the armed Habash, described his organization's struggle against Israel. The whole in position in an interview with Le ternational community now considers Monde correspondent Eric Rouleau HABASH: Negotiated settlement "con re that the settlement drawn up at Geneva that was published in the February 6 sult only in recognition of Israel." wiU be a definitive one. issue of the Paris daily. "Surrounded by bodyguards armed Le Monde: You have little cause to the teeth," Rouleau wrote, "he re ment, leading to the recovery of part for worry, since the United States and ceived us in the modest headquarters of Palestine, would be only a step Israel are opposed to the PLO's par of the PFLP, in the Chatila refugee toward the united and democratic ticipation in the peace conference. camp in Beirut. Dr. Habash is no Palestine that you are calling for. longer the man built like a boxer, Habash: Every politician must look the picture of health and strength, that Habash: I am not opposed in prin ahead. Personally, I am convinced we had met five years ago. His mous ciple to proceeding by stages, provid that Washington wants to incorporate tache is stiU thick and black, but his ed that these stages advance our the PLO in the international negotia close-cropped hair is tinged with gray. cause. But the present circumstances tions. Mr. Kissinger is too shrewd His face is emaciated; his body, some do not favor such progress. The re to think that he can succeed in guar what thinner, has a slight stoop. Hav lationship of forces, regionally and anteeing the continuity of U. S. oil ing survived a heart attack. Dr. Ha internationally, is not in our favor. interests and imperialism in the Mid bash appears older than his forty- Negotiations can result only in the im dle East without first disarming the eight years." plicit or explicit recognition of the Palestinian resistance. We have many Habash reaffirmed that the PFLP's State of Israel, with its borders guar indications about the real intentions "strategic objective," which it shares anteed by a number of Arab countries of our enemies. Secret contacts between with the other resistance organiza and foreign powers. Palestinian figures and representatives tions, is "the reestablishment of the of the United States and Israel have unity of our country, the repatriation Le Monde: Isn't the triumphal wel Increased in recent months. of those who were driven out of it, come accorded Yasir Arafat by the and the creation of a democratic-secu General Assembly of the United Na Le Monde: Isn't it normal for such lar state." But he emphasized that "any tions proof that the international re contacts to take place, even between settlement that would lead to the con lationship offorces has turned in your belligerents who are not seeking a solidation of the Zionist entity by fav or? compromise at any price? granting it some legitimacy would in our view constitute a form of capitu Habash: In the abstract, the event Habash: Our confrontation with the lation." could appear to be a resounding vic Zionists is not comparable to any oth The interview continued: tory. In the given context, however, er conflict. The Palestinian masses do this welcome seems highly suspect to not accept and will never accept the Le Monde: Your opponents in the us. Many states that have declared existence of the Jewish state. Yet any PLO claim that a negotiated settle- their support for the PLO's admission contact or any negotiation with the

Intercontinental Press Israelis is an acknowledgment of their Le Monde: Do you think an armed Habash: There are some differences presence. Similarly, the participation confrontation is inevitable between separating us from our Soviet allies, of the PLO at the Geneva conference your supporters and Arafat's? differences that, when aU is said and would amount to de facto recognition done, are quite natural between rev of the Zionist entity. Habash: We will try to avoid it. olutionary forces. But we hope to re Worse still, negotiations will inescap)- Our guns should be pointed exclusive solve them through ongoing dialogue. ably lead to the de jure recognition ly toward the Zionist enemy. But if The same applies to People's China, of Israel, since they will take place in we encounter resistance from an Arab with which we have no substantial dif accordance with the terms of Resolu force, no matter who it is, we will ferences in the present phase of our tion 242 of the Security Council, which know how to fight, as we did in Jor struggle. In any case, the course of Mr. Arafat will be obliged to accept dan in September 1970. events, concrete reality, will see to it once the paragraph concerning the that the debate is resoived!" Palestinians has been reworked, i Le Monde: Mr. Arafat has told us The Le Monde correspondent said that he hopes to maintain a dialogue his own observations indicated that with the "Front of Refusal"^ which most Palestinians seemed to support he describes as a natural opposition the PLO position, and hoped it would within a democratic movement. be represented at the Geneva confer "We want and look forward an ence. Hah ash responded angrily that Habash: We refuse to be treated as xiously to a new war," PFLP leader such views were based on ignorance; a parliamentary opposition. We rep George Habash said in an interview a settlement in present conditions resent the revolution against the sup with the French-language Beirut daily would mean renouncing definitively porters of sellout. When the time L'Orient-Le Jour published Feb the right to 80 percent of the Pales comes, the whole Palestinian people ruary 11. tinian territory. wiU he with us. "Israel may win a quick war, but the result of a long war will definitely Moreover, he told Rouleau, Arafat Le Monde: You are in great danger be in our favor," Habash was quot posed a false dilemma by suggesting of being isolated internationally. Both ed as having said. "A new war is no that the alternative to Palestinian ac the Soviet Union and the United States danger to the Palestinian people. They ceptance of a ministate was the return want peace in the Middle East. can't suffer any worse than they have of the West Bank and the Gaza strip since the 1948 creation of Israel on to King Hussein of Jordan. "The 2. The "Front of Refusal" includes those their homeland. But it will be a grave choice is not between the PLO and resistance organizations that oppose a ne threat to Israel's existence and U. S. King Hussein, but between capitula gotiated settlement of the Palestinian ques imperialist interests." tion, in opposition to the majority of the tion and armed struggle. Our duty Habash charged that the Arab oil- PLO. It is composed essentially of three is to mobilize and arm the masses so organizations: the PFLP led by Habash; producing regimes had been "timid" that they can reconquer their home the PFLP-General Command led by in their embargo of the United States land—bang, bang, bang! It will not Ahmed JibrU; and the Arab Liberation after the 1973 war. He said the Arabs be easy to achieve this objective. But Front, a small group supported by the should have nationalized U. S. oil in why should we be less combative, and fraqi government. — IP terests and other holdings. □ less militant, than the Vietnamese peo ple? We would rather fight for twenty or even thirty years than adopt the logic of collaborators. .. ." Jurists Document Repression in Uruguay The PFLP leader said that his or ganization would withdraw complete ly from the PLO if the latter attended A report by the International Commis mer political prisoners who had been con the Geneva conference. sion of Jurists published in the U. S. Con ditionally released have been rearrested Hah ash charged that under pressure gressional Record February 4 charges and held in solitary confinement. from Egypt and Saudi Arabia, Ara that a new wave of arrests and political • Many new arrests have been made. fat had agreed at the Rabat confer repression has been carried out in Uru • Prisoners being held in military bar racks are reported to have been subjected ence to support a negotiated settle guay. to "corporal punishment." ment, in exchange for the recognition Since the December 19, 1974, assas sination of Ramon Trabal, the Uru • Defense lawyers have been hampered of the PLO as the "sole legitimate rep guayan military attache in Paris, the com in their legal efforts. resentative of the Palestinian people." mission reported the following to have • Visits to prisoners and other privi Arafat's agreement to open a "dia occurred: leges have been suspended at all places logue with Hussein, he said, is "in vio • On December 20 the bullet-riddled of detention. lation of aU the resolutions adopted by bodies of five persons were found on the the PLO condemning the Hashemite Meany Predicts 10% outskirts of Montevideo. The victims were Unemployment in U.S. regime." former Uruguayan political prisoners who had been living in Buenos Aires. George Meany, president of the AFL- 1. The UN resolution refers simply to the They disappeared on November 8 sifter CIO labor federation, predicted February problem of the "refugees," while the PLO being abducted by a group claiming to 9 that the U.S. unemployment rate would insists that the Palestinian people be ac be the Argentine police. They were not reach 10 percent by July. "We're past the corded recognition of their "legitimate na seen again until their bodies were found. recession stage; we're going into a de tional rights." — IP • Since December 19 hundreds of for pression," he said. February 24, J 975 French Trotskyists Form New Organization

Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire Holds First Congress

[The following article appeared in the tories, the acceleration of inflation, and (and more than 5% miscellaneous). Stu January 31 issue ol Inprecor, a fortnight the appearance of massive unemployment dents accounted for no more than 24% ly news bulletin published by the United require that the vanguard be more capa of the membership (which may increase Secretariat of the Fourth International.] ble than before of offering precise and somewhat during the university year); concrete responses on the way to struggle. high-schoolers were barely 5%. Last In this political conjuncture, the weak spring a national conference of the Taupe ness of the social roots of the far left and Rouge( Red Mole) groups of worker sym- The constituent congress of the Ligue the ultraleft and opportunist deviations pathizers and factory cells of the Front Communiste Revolutionnaire (Revolu that run through it to a large extent exert Communiste Revolutionnaire (Revolu tionary Communist League), French sec their full weight. The far left is suffering tionary Communist Front, predecessor of tion of the Fourth International, was held from a general crisis of growth marked the LCR) had assembled 1,300 militants in Paris December 19-22, 1974. This con by the recomposition of certain organiza in a provincial city, Lyon. Beyond these gress will go down in the history of the tions (the departure of the Rocard ten figures, nevertheless, the workers im French Trotskyist movement, for it was dency from the centrist Parti Socialists plantation is very uneven: strong in the devoted to analyzing a social and politi Unifie [PSU—United Socialist party], for hospitals, posts and telegraphs, for exam cal reality very much different from that example), by the outbreak of splits (in ple; relatively weaker in the industrial which prevailed during the three con Lutte Ouvriere [Workers Struggle], an proletariat, the metal and automobile in gresses of the ex-Ligue Communiste economistic Trotskyist current), the disap dustries, etc. (1969, 1971, and 1972), which was dis pearance of a centralized Mao-spontaneist solved by the government in June 1973 current in favor of a relative strengthening More important, a growing number of for its antifascist and antiracist activities. of the Mao-Stalinist sects (Humanite trade-union militants (nearly 55% of the The new organization recorded the deep Rouge and Front Rouge), the absence members are in the CGT, the CFDT— changes in relation to the past, especially of any definite orientation on the part the two main workers confederations — as regards its links with workers strug of some organizations (like Revolution, or the FEN, the teachers union) have a gles and the consequent new problems an ultraleft current that split from the real experience of struggle and are taking of intervention that must be resolved. Ligue Communiste in 1970), and the on responsibilities in the trade unions (this complete marginalization of the Alliance is the case in various forms for more The Political Context des Jeunes pour le Socialisme-Organisa- than one-third of the Ligue's trade union tion Communiste Internationaliste (Young ists). The debates on the tasks before us The three congresses of the ex-Ligue Socialist Alliance-Internationalist Commu have correspondingly changed; they have Communiste took place in a political con nist Organization, a rightist sect claiming become very concrete. text that could be defined as the post- to be Trotskyist). Between the third congress of the ex- May '68 situation. Gaullism was then en Ligue Communiste and the founding con tering into open crisis. The reformist A Changing Organization gress of the LCR our movement has workers parties were offering no consistent grown 15-20%, despite the much too fre political perspective to the working class, The Trotskyist movement tied to the quent departure of militants. which was conscious of the impact this Fourth International has proven itself the But this considerable progress (let us deficiency had had during the 1968 gen most capable within the French far left recall that six years ago we were inter eral strike. The revolutionary far left was of grasping the new features of the polit vening almost exclusively in the student affirming its presence and seizing op ical situation and the class struggle. But milieu) should not conceal the weaknesses portunities for important central mobi this has not prevented the necessity of of our development. lizations. A new generation of vanguard opening a very broad internal debate. The organization remains very young worker militants was progressively All the more so in that we have reached politically. To be sure, it has "aged" con emerging in the factories. a very particular stage in our organiza siderably. The average age of the dele Today the French political scene is dom tional development. The statistics on the gates to the congress was three years inated by the international economic reces organization and the congress (social higher than the average age of the dele sion. Given the current state of the rela composition, sex, age, and trade-union gates to the third congress of the ex-Ligue tionship of forces between the classes, the responsibilities of members and delegates) Communiste. The most numerous age Giscard d'Estaing regime appears inca illustrate the progress that has been reg brackets in the organization are 21-25 pable of resolving the open crisis of bour istered not only in comparison with the years old (47% ), 26-30 years(27% ), and geois leadership in France, marked by pre-May '68 period but also in compari 18-20 years (13%). But about 50% of the the shaking of Bonapartism. The regime son with the past two years. militants have been in the Trotskyist is condemned to administering the crisis The most important differences with the as best it can while prepeuring for the movement only since 1972. Only 26% three congresses of the ex-Ligue Commu coming social confrontations. The revo have more than five years political ac niste concern social composition. Some lutionary and worker militants are now tivity in our current; 21% joined in 1974. 61% of the militants were wage workers This shows that while the organization confronted with claims of the big reformist parties (the SP and the CP) that they (69% if we include salaried students); 12% has grown numericaliy in a regular way, have a solution to the crisis: the Union were blue-collar workers, 17% white-col it has aiso lost a significant number of de la Gauche (Union of the Left) and its lar workers, 5% technicians, 3% super militants; and that is serious. Common Program of government. Final visory personnel, 13% tenured teachers, The sexual composition of the organiza ly, the struggles waged earlier in the fac 8% substitute teachers, 4% unempioyed tion is progressing. Nevertheless, it is still Intercontinental Press very unequal. About 30% of the militants character of the crisis of the regime. Giv dency 3, which feared that too sharp a of the LCR are women. More significant en the current state of things, the regime differentiation was being made between ly, though, this percentage falls to 23% cannot expect the breakup of the Union the broad vanguard and its workers com among the delegates and 16% among de la Gauche and a consequent move of ponent, which would lead to a worker- the city-level leadership. the SP toward a centrist solution, despite ist orientation. This debate was central because of the implications it could have In a more general fashion, the work the debate now going on between the SP for the analysis of the political situation, er militants meet important difficulties in and the CP. In fact, the recomposition for the orientation toward mass work, taking on central responsibility in the or of the SP would be placed in question and for the choices of how to construct ganization, and strengthening of the fac in the event of the breakup of the Union the organization (on the city and nation tory cells has occurred much more slow de la Gauche. While stressing the bour al levels). ly than the multiplication of organized geois nature of the Common Program of sympathizing groups (the Taupe Rouge the Union de la Gauche and the existence Finally, the congress concluded its work groups) in the factories. of a class-collaborationist orientation on by adopting a series of measures that The problem cannot be presented solely the part of the CP and the SP, the con should accelerate the changes now going in figures. The French Trotskyist move gress rejected characterizing the Union on in our organization. Priority was giv ment has become a real national politi de la Gauche as an embryonic popular en to political training and above all to cal organization (the "smallest of the po front (which was proposed by Tendency cadre-building, to the taking in charge litical parties," as the bourgeois journal 4). The essential contradiction of the of the workers intervention by the central ists sometimes say). But the LCR is still Union de la Gauche remains that it leadership and the establishment of pub far from being in position to offer a con is a front of class collaboration but is lications and cadre schools specifically crete and credible alternative to the re perceived by the working class as rep adapted to the education of worker mili resenting the unity of the big workers formist parties. We have never been so tants; to the transformation of our press deeply involved in important workers parties. It thus tends simultaneously to system by preparing to launch a daily struggles (the most recent example being mislead the class struggle and to stimu newspaper next September or October; to the postal strike); never have the themes late it through the hopes that it raises a modification in the functioning of the we have raised been so hotly discussed in by offering an apparently credible alterna leadership. It is in fact a whole new sys the workers movement (the question of tive to the crisis of bourgeois leadership. tem of organization that has to be set self-organization of the working class, for Consequently, it is the reformist project up progressively, that has to be based example); and never has our trade-union of the CP and the SP that must be direct on a qualitative politicization of the in implantation been so large. But we are ly denounced as such, rather than putting ternal life of the Ligue and on the trans stUl incapable of practically offering na the main emphasis on the organic alliance formation of the manner of carrying out tional solutions to the workers struggles of the CP and SP with some bourgeois mass work. or national outlets for the tendency bat forces (the left radicals) as Tendency 1 Essentially, the discussion and debate tles waged within the trade unions. The proposed. dealt with the application of the planks results of five years of antimilitarist ac The congress concretely located the of the Transitional Program to the tac tivity, fed by the crisis of the French army, place occupied in the construction of the tics of party-building in a given situation have gone beyond anything expected. But French section of the Fourth Internationai with a particular relationship of forces. the far left has not been able to initiate by the emergence of a broad vanguard — In this regard the discussion is of in central mobilizations to support the move and within it a workers vanguard of a terest to the entire International. ment of the draftees as large as the mobili mass character — as described in the Euro This congress was prepared by the hold zations against the Debre law in 1973. pean perspectives document adopted by ing of a real democratic debate, which is We stand at a very particular stage of the Tenth World Congress of the Fom:th what made the congress possible. Any cur our development in which our objective International. Tendency 4 denied the cen rent assembling the signatures of thirty responsibilities have expanded consider tral place of this vanguard, rejecting the or more members on the basis of a po ably, in which our capacities for interven conclusions of the European document litical orientation had tendency rights: tion in the class struggle are far beyond To reach the masses through concrete equal financing provided by the organi what they were six or even three years mobilizations generated by setting in mo zation; the right to hold local, regional, ago, but in which we still cannot offer tion the broad vanguard that represents and national meetings equal space in a national alternative to the policy of the the generation of militants who, without the internal bulletin; equal rights in send reformist parties inpractice. having broken strategically with the re ing speakers around the organization; formists, are concretely escaping the con equal time for presentation of reports at Congress Debate trol of the bureaucracies and asserting a the congress. The discussion time at the capacity for independent initiatives. To congress (apart from the reports) was The opening of a broad internal de win hegemony over this vanguard by divided according to the percentage of bate was made necessary by the com orienting it toward the masses and by votes registered at the regional congresses; bination of a change in the French po qualitatively strengthening our Implanta there was also proportional representation litical situation and a stage of tension tion in the broad workers vanguard. To on the new central committee. in our organizational development, the apply in this manner a united front tactic The rdative political weakness of the combination itself unfolding before the based on the desire of the masses for unity organization and some organizational dif backdrop of a deepening of the class and for a program of class struggle. To ficulties had negative influences on the de struggle on a European scale consequently address ourselves within the base. But the development of the debate The organization was divided into four far left on a priority basis to the centrist as a whole represented important prog tendencies over the orientation to adopt political currents that in their own way ress compared with the three congresses in regard to the analysis of the political reflect the process of radicalization going of the ex-Ligue Communiste. A real tradi situation, the modification of the form on among the working class; to do this tion of democratic centralism has thus and content of our work in the masses, by opening a debate, especially with the taken hold. And this is decisive for the and the organizational measures that PSU. This overall orientation was rejected future; for other dd)ates will certainly be should consequently be taken. The theses by Tendency 1, which saw it,among other necessary. of Tendency 2 were the ones adopted things, as a temptation to adapt to the After this debate, Tendency 2 won 59% by the congress. exclusive and confused aspirations of the of the delegates to the congress; Tenden The congress stressed the structural broad workers vanguard, and by Ten cy 3 had 19%, Tendency 1 had 18.6%,

February 24, 1975 and Tendency 4 had 3%. de Izquierda Revolutionaria — Movement cal or union activity with no right of The debate at the congress centered only of the Revolutionary Left], and a com redress." on the situation in France. But the con rade of the Chilean Communist League A statement on the case by the Inter gress was nevertheless an internationalist the messages sent by the Manifesto-PDUP national Marxist Group, British section one. This was reflected in many ways: group and Lotta Continua (Italy), the of the Fourth International, pointed to its request to integrate into the Fourth Junta of Revolutionary Coordination of the broader context of the witch-hunt International; the greetings it sent to po Latin America, the Argentine Partido Re- hysteria against the Irish created by the litical prisoners in Spain, to the peoples volucionario de los Trabajadores; and government's "Prevention of Terrorism of the former Portuguese colonies in Afri finally, the greetings brought by a rep Act," whose provisions are similar to those ca, to the peoples of Indochina in strug resentative of the United Secretariat of in Rule 42 of the Immigration Act "The gle, to the Ceylonese comrade Rohana the Fourth International. lack of organised protest against the de Wijeweera, who had just been sentenced The first congress of the Front Com- portation of Irish people," the IMG state to life imprisonment, to the Chilean mili muniste Revolutionnaire, which has be ment said, "has created an atmosphere tants confronted by the dictatorship; the come the Ligue Communiste Revolution in which Franco Caprino's deportation presence of members of many organiza naire, thus continued the tradition of the can be ordered so complacently by a tions of the Fourth International; the Parti Communiste Internationaliste and Labour Home Secretary." greetings brought by Chilean mili the Jeunesse Communiste Revolutionnaire, On January 25, the day after the de tants: Luis Vitale, Trotskyist militant dissolved by the government in June 1968 portation order against Caprino was of the Revolutionary Socialist party, Ed- and of the ex-Ligue Communiste, dis dropped, Danny Ryan, national organizer gardo Enriquez of the MIR [Movimiento solved in June 1973. □ of Clann na h'Eireann (the Official re publican movement in Britain), was put oir a plane for Ireland. Ryan has been Effort to Deport Franco Coprino Halted a resident in Britain for twenty-five years. Labour MP Ron Thomas wrote to Jen kins January 22 demanding an explana tion for the exclusion order against Ryan. Thomas said, "I have known Danny Ryan Immigrant Worker Wins Victory in Britain all my life as an active trade unionist in By Kevin Thomas the Bristol area, and 1 would like some indication of the evidence against him London to organise and fight for the rights of which justifies his exclusion under Part 2 After holding him for more than a workers in the catering industry — many of the Prevention of Terrorism (Tempo month, the Labour government was of whom are Italians, Spaniards, Por rary Provisions) Act." forced January 24 to release from prison tuguese, Arabs, Iranians, Turks, etc." According to a report in the January and drop its plans to deport Franco Cap- Efforts to publicise the case by the 25 Guardian, Ryan's lawyer indicated rino, an Italian immigrant working in Franco Caprino Support Committee were that they were considering an application London. This important victory for civil instrumental in winning his release. A to the European Commission of Human liberties bodes well for future challenges daily vigil was organised outside Home Rights on the grounds that the "Preven to government harassment of Immigrants Secretary Jenkins's house after he returned tion of Terrorism Act" contravened the in Britain. from a visit to the United States, where, European convention of human rights by Caprino was arrested December 18 and ironically, he discussed civil rights. introducing detention without trial and faced with a deportation order under Rule Public indignation was especially by discriminating against persons on the 42 of the 1971 Immigration Act. No spe aroused by the lack of any real appeals grounds of nationality. If carried through, cific charges were made against him, nor procedure. Under the terms of the 1971 this would be the first legal challenge to were any necessary under this scandalous act, Caprino's deportation hearing, sched Jenkins' anti-Irish legislation. law. Rule 42 empowers the Home Secre uled for January 27, was to be held in Caprino, despite his victory in having tary, currently Roy Jenkins, to deport at secret before three knights — all in their deportation proceedings dropped, is still his discretion any foreigner—even one sixties. He and his lawyer would not have not completely out of danger. The gov who has lived and worked here for been allowed to hear in detail the reasons ernment does not intend to give him com years—if he thinks it will be "conducive for the expulsion order, and the final pensation for his five weeks in prisob, to public good as being in the interests judgment in the case would still have re and his employer, the large department of national security or of the relations be mained in the hands of the Home store Selfridges, considers him to have tween the UK and any other country or Secretary. left their employ on December 18 "to go for other reasons of a political nature." Protests against the deportation and the abroad." If Caprino should lose his job The smear campaign spread by the alarming implications of Rule 42 came it may adversely affect his chances of capitalist media was that Caprino is al from various quarters. On January 22 a getting a residence permit, an option for legedly a member of Lotta Continua, a protest motion was presented in the House forcing him out of the country that is left-wing group in Italy, and that he had of Commons by six Labour MPs. They still open to the Labour government. □ connections with the IRA. Caprino denied criticised the provisions of Rule 42 and the specific allegations and denied that he called on the government to revise the had been involved in any activities that appeals procedure to bring it into con Pet Owners Beware! would give cause for the Home Secretary's formity with the principles of the United An error introduced into the text of the deportation order. Nations declaration of human rights. Arvada, Colorado, animal-control ordi "The real reason [for Caprino's victimi Earlier, the January 12 London Sun nance makes it one of the harshest laws sation]," explained Terry Kelly in the Jan day Times reported that Alvaro Miranda, in the United States. According to a Feb uary 23 issue of the British Trotskyist chairman of the international branch of ruary 5 report by Associated Press, the newspaper Red Weekly, "seems to be his the Transport and General Workers ordinance provides that if a stray pet active membership of the International Union, considered the case "a dangerous picked up by the city is not claimed by Branch of the Transport and General precedent, because it could apply to any its owner within twenty-four hours, the Workers Union, and his role in helping immigrant who took part in lawful politi owner will be destroyed.

Intercontinental Press Chronicle of Current Events i

Reviewed by Marilyn Vogt

The Kremlin bureaucrats' intensive were broken during the long months they able abroad. drive to repress this samfedat journal has spent in the hands of the KGB, and re In May 1974, three dissidents — Tatya- failed. After a lapse of more than one and nounced their protest activities. They were na Velikanova, a mathematician; Sergei a half years, the journal has again begun made to claim that they believed the move Kovalyov,2 a biologist; and Tatyana to circulate, reporting on the activities of ment for democracy in the Soviet Union Khodorovich, a linguist, all of whom were the democratic opposition in the Soviet only aided the enemy and to state that in founding members of the Initiative Union and on the bureaucracy's attempts the Soviet Union people were not placed Group —defied the secret police threats to crush it. The last issue to appear before in psychiatric hospitals as a punishment against anyone known to possess or dis this lapse in the journal's appearance was for political dissent. tribute copies of the samizdat journals: Issue No. 27, dated October 1972. In November 1973, the Brezhnev gang They openly delivered three new issues of Beginning in January 1972 the Soviet was able to register another ignoble vic the Chronicle of Current Events to for secret police (KGB)launched a severe re tory when it published the recantation of eign correspondents in Moscow. pressive campaign throughout the Soviet Ukrainian Marxist Ivan Dzyuba. Dzyuba Since the spring of 1974 two more is Union but primarily concentrated in Mos sues of the Chronicle have reportedly be cow and Leningrad in the Russian Soviet gun circulating. Socialist Republic and in the Ukrainian Chronicle of Current Events, Issue No. The Kremlin had even resorted to a Soviet Socialist Republic. The purpose of 28 (December 31, 1972), 31 pp.; Is "hostage" technique to try to keep the the crackdown was to stop the flow of sue No. 29 (July 31, 1973), 32 pp.; Chronicle from circulating. The KGB unauthorized writings, specifically the sa- Issue No. 30 (December 31, 1973), made it known that it had a list of twenty mizdat journal the Chronicle of Current 43 pp. (Russian-language samizdat to thirty persons who would be arrested journeil from the Soviet Union, avail Events and the Ukrainian samvydav if a new issue of the journal were to ap able in printed form from Khronika journal, the Ukrainian Herald. pear. In a statement prefacing Chronicle Press, 505 Eighth Ave., New York, Hundreds of searches were conducted No. 28 "from the Moscow Editors, to the and hundreds of persons were interro N. Y. 10018.) Readers of the Chronicle," the editors stat gated. Widespread arrests took place. In ed that they would no longer be intimi tercontinental Press has reported on the dated by this threat and that they believe fates of many of those who were ar was arrested in 1972 and tried and sen it is their duty to renew publication of rested—long terms in prisons and camps tenced in March 1973 because of his well- the journal. or compulsory "treatment" in psychiatric documented Leninist critique of the Soviet The three new issues under review here hospital prisons—on the basis of the re bureaucrats' nationalities policy. Interna center their coverage on events that oc ports that have made their way abroad. tionalism or Russification. i He was forced curred in the aftermath of the KGB crack The bureaucrats not only used police to say that he made erroneous analyses down initiated in January 1972. Although methods with closed trials and harsh sen in his perspectives regarding the bureau further arrests, searches, and interroga tences in their attempts to stamp out the crats' nationalities policy, leading him to tions continued to occur throughout the network of uncontrolled and uncensored mistakenly conclude that there was a na period covered, i.e., October 1972 through discussion that samizdat represents. They tionalities problem in the Soviet Union. December 1973 (one year and two also resorted to the recantation and "con The revival of Stalin's use of "confes months), a large part of the material con fession" methods used by Stalin in the no sions" secured under torture was intend cerns the trials and sentences of those who torious Moscow show trials in the late ed to further intimidate and disorient the 1930s, when he forced prominent Old Bol dissidents and the Soviet people who sym were arrested in the first nine months of 1972. In addition, there are detailed ac sheviks to say they were traitors and sa pathize with their statements and actions. counts of events that received considerable boteurs. However, although the repressive mea international press coverage at the time It was in August 1973 that Stalin's heirs sures took a tremendous toll, they not finally brought Pyotr Yakir and Viktor only failed to silence protests; they failed they occurred. These issues also describe Krasin, two prominent dissidents, to trial to crush the Chronicle of Current Events new manifestations of opposition to the for "anti-Soviet activities." Both had been and the Ukrainian Herald. regime's antidemocratic policies that sur instrumental in the formation of the Initia New issues of the Ukrainian Herald faced in the midst of the repression and tive Group for the Defense of Human (Nos. 7 and 8, dated spring 1974) are appear to be gathering momentum. Rights in the USSR, which was established reportedly circulating in Ukraine, al in June 1969 with the stated purpose of en though copies are not yet readily avail- 2. According to the New York Times of gaging in only such forms of protest as December 30, 1974, Kovalyov was ar were permitted by the Soviet constitution. 1. Ivan Dzyuba, Internationalism or Rus rested by KGB agents December 27, and The Initiative Group has issued appeals sification? (New York: Monad Press. Dis flown to Lithuania, apparently to face on behalf of arrested dissidents. tributed by Pathfinder Press, 1974), 262 trial for his support for dissident activi Both men, who were arrested in 1972, pp. $2.95. ties. February 24, 1975 The following is a brief summary of described. For example, Kronid A. Lyu- strued to be too pro-Ukrainian. In addi some of the key events described. Many barsky, an astronomer, was sentenced in tion, many of them were expelled simply of the news items have already been re October 1972 to five years in a strict- for being acquaintances of some of those ported in Intercontinental Press. They are regime camp under Article 70 (subversive who were arrested during January listed here merely to provide an indica "anti-Soviet" activity) for possessing sa through May 1972. tion of the scope and nature of the ma mizdat writings and foreign books. Pyotr At least six of the trials held in Odessa terial these Chronicles contain. Starchik, a psychologist, was sentenced in in the summer and fall of 1972 are sum December 1972 to compulsory psychiatric marized: that of Nina Strokatova (four Issue No. 28. treatment after being charged under Ar years strict-regime camp), Aleksei Rezni- Doted December 31, 1972: ticle 70 for distributing a leaflet calling kov (five years strict-regime camp), and •The Death of Yuri Galanskov. Be for the overthrow of "the dictatorship of Aleksei Prityka (two and a half years cause the prison officials refused t pro the party." camp), tried in May for their statements vide him with the diet and medical atten ^Repression in Ukraine. The Ukrain and actions against Russification; and of tion he needed in view of his serious sto ian SSR was the hardest hit by the re I. A. HeP (five years special-regime camp mach ulcers, Galanskov died in the Mor pressive drive. Many of the regime's op [the harshest regime], five years strict- dovian prison camp November 2, 1972. ponents in this, the largest of the non- regime camp, and five years exile), Ste- phany Shabatura (five years camp and He was serving a seven-year sentence for Russian republics — with a population of more than forty miliion —have criticized three years exile), and Irina Stasiv-Kaly- his samizdat writings and his actions in nets and her husband, Igor Kalynets, bureaucratic policies as Marxists and so defense of arrested dissidents. (See Inter (six years camp and three years exile for cialists. Hundreds of workers, students, continental Press, November 20, 1972, both), for their protests against the sen and intellectuals were arrested in Ukraine p. 1264.) The Chronicle summarizes his tence Moroz received. in the period from January through May activities in the democratic opposition be •The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet fore his arrest in January 1967 and the 1972. of the USSR Answers the Letter of 273 deterioration of his health while in prison. The Chronicle reports further trials of Jews. The letter referred to called on the Also included is an obituary and trib some of those arrested. In November presidium to grant amnesty on the fiftieth 1972, Nikolai Plakhotnyuk, a physician, ute to Galanskov by political prisoners anniversary of the Soviet Union (Decem was sent to a psychiatric hospital for dis in the Ural and Mordovian prison camps ber 1972) to Jews who were serving pris (see Intercontinental Press. March 19, tributing the Ukrainian Herald emd other on sentences because they demanded the 1973, p. 319); a statement of sympathy unauthorized materials. Boris Kovgar, a right to emigrate to Israel. More than to Galanskov's relatives from twenty-five one-time police agent—who recanted in twelve persons who backed up this re politicai prisoners who were Galanskov's his own way and wrote a document, which quest with a personal appearance out friends; and an appeal to USSR General he distributed, telling what he knew about side the December 18 meeting of the Su Prosecutor Rudenko from two political secret-police activities in Ukraine—was preme Soviet were arrested. Most were prisoners—V. K. Pavlenkov and G. V. Ga- arrested and sent to a mental hospital. sentenced to no more than a fifteen-day Vasyl Romanyuk was arrested and sen vriiov — demanding an official investiga term. tion into the circumstances surrounding tenced. He was a priest from Kosmach 9Short Communiques. The arrest of Galanskov's death and also demanding (a little town in Western Ukraine), who Leonid Plyushch in January 1972 is re improved living conditions in the camps. had filed a written protest to the regime ported. Also reported is information on Both Pavlenkov and Gavrilov were serv against the fourteen-year sentence Ukrain the trial of a Lithuanian, Stasis S. Ya- ing terms in camp because they had car ian historian Valentyn Moroz received for kas, who was sentenced by the Lithuanian ried out work in defense of political de his dissident writings. Romanyuk was ar Supreme Court to serve two years in a mocracy in the Soviet Union. They have rested for this action and in June 1972 strict-regime ceunp for possession and dis been involved in a number of protests by was himself sentenced to serve a fifteen- tribution of the Chronicle of Current political prisoners in the camps. year term!3 Events and of other samizdat writings. 9Chronicle, Case No. 24. The KGB Samuel Gluzman, a psychiatrist believed Other brief items in this section tell of crackdown to crush the Chronicle has by the Chronicle's editors to be one of Valery Chalidze being deprived of his been labeled "Case No. 24" in the Chron the persons responsible for a samizdat Soviet citizenship while on a visit abroad, icle, apparently because this was the case critique of the official psychiatric report Pavel Litvinov being released from his number assigned to this endeavor by the used to justify Pyotr Grigorenko's con term in exile, and two protests by politi KGB itself. finement in a psychiatric hospital prison, cal prisoners that took place in the last In previous issues of the Chronicle, the was sentenced in October to seven years in months of 1972. materials included under this heading con a strict-regime camp and three years exile. cerned the numerous searches, interro Additional arrests are reported as well gations, and arrests of persons suspected as numerous instances of extra-judicial Issue No. 29. of being involved in circulating the Chron persecution. For exeunple, dozens of per Dated July 31, 1973: icle. However, with issue No. 28, ma- sons were expelled from their posts in aca teriEiis under the heading "Case No. 24" demic institutes in Kiev and Lviv in the •Chronicle of Human Rights in the primarily involve searches and interroga summer and fail of 1972 for being "un USSR. Issue Nos. 1 and 2 of this Chron tions of persons on the basis of testimony reliable," i. e., in many cases because of icle published in New York are reviewed. ailegedly given by Pyotr Yakir and Vik scholeurly work done in such areas as The Chronicle of Human Rights in the tor Krasin or in connection with the case foiklore, archeology, ethnography, and USSR was put out by Peter Reddaway, against them. Some of the reports in this philosophy, work the bureaucrats con- a professor of political science at the Lon issue are similar to those carried in the don School of Economics, who has done foreign press in the last months of 1972, 3. For Moroz's description of Kosmach considerable writing on the Soviet oppo when several individuals, for example, and for Romanyuk's appeal for Moroz, sition; Edward Kline, a New York busi Yakir's daughter Irina, were allowed to see Report From the Beria Reserve: The nessman; and exiled Soviet dissident Va- see Yakir. At that time he reportedly stated Protest Writings of Valentyn Moroz, edited iery Chalidze, who now lives in New York that he now saw the "error" of his ways. by John Kolasky. (Chicago: Cataract City. •Trials. Several trials and cases are Press, 1974). The purpose of this emigre Chronicle

Intercontinental Press was to report as closely as possible on was sentenced in April to seven years in the criminal code as he had previously the events the Chronicle of Current Events a strict-regime camp and five years exile been charg under. Article 190 ("anti- would have reported if it had not been for possession of Ukrainian samvydav Soviet" activity), and sentenced him to forced under police pressure to suspend literature and for his own literary works. serve another three-year term, in a strict- publication. •The Case of Leonid Plyushch. regime camp. •Trial of Davydov and Petrov. In July •Chronicle, Case No. 24. Irina Belo- 1973 Georgy Davydov, a geological en gorodskaya, who previously served one gineer, and Vyacheslav Petrov, a factory year in camp for her actions in defense worker, were tried in Leningrad under of Anatoly Marchenko (author of Article 70 for possession and distribution My Testimony),^ was again arrested in of samizdat literature. Davydov received January 1973. According to the Chroni a sentence of five years in a strict-regime \ 1 cle's report, she was apparently forced camp and two years exUe. Petrov's sen to testify against other dissidents. tence was three years in camp and two Throughout the first six months of 1973 years exile. dozens of persons were brought in for / •Investigation in Orel. Several persons 1 questioning, evidently on the hasis of Ya- were arrested in this city (which has a kir's and Krasin's testimony. The num population of about 150,000 and is lo — Jf. ber who actually met with the two de cated 200 miles southwest of Moscow) fendants, however, was very small. Kra and were subsequently the object of an sin's wife, Nadezhda Emelkina, was also investigation and defendants in trials held pressured into making statements that the in the first six months of 1973. They were KGB used as the basis for calling dissi allegedly involved in trying to put to dents in for interrogation. gether a journal called the Patriotic Front 9Events in Lithuania. In March and of Russia. One of those arrested, Viktor AprU 1973 the KGB conducted investi Khaustov, had previously served a three- gations on the proliferation of small year term in camp for defending Alek- groups in Lithuania studying Lithuanian sandr Ginzburg and Yuri Galanskov in culture, history, and folklore. These 1967. The others arrested—Kuzina, Sa- groups reportedly involved trade union vinkin, and Egorov —were tried in July ists, university students, and intellectuals. and received terms ranging from three Many persons were called in for question to seven years. ing. The KGB accused a large number •Trials in Ukraine. Ivan Dzyuba's trial YAKIR: Broken by KGB. of them of distributing nationalist litera in March 1973 is described. According to ture and trying to link up with Armenian, the Chronicle, Dzyuba's sentence was five Georgian, and Latvian groups. years in a strict-regime camp. He had Plyushch, a Kievan mathematician, was The KGB also conducted investigations not yet recanted at that time, although charged under Article 62 of the Ukrain to try to stop the circulation of the Chron by the Chronicle's account his ability to ian Criminal Code (equivalent to Article icle of the Lithuanian Catholic Church. resist the KGB pressure may already have 70 of the Russian Criminal Code). He •Short Communiques. Several addi been considerably weakened. He was par was charged with: tional arrests and sentences are listed here, ticularly vulnerable to KGB maltreatment 1. Possessing and distributing copies of including that of Ukrainian socialist Vya because of his poor health. He suffers the Chronicle of Current Events and the cheslav ChornovU. He was tried in Feb from an advanced case of tuberculosis. Ukrainian Herald. ruary 1973 and sentenced to seven years Evgeny Sverstyuk, author of several 2. Writing articles having an "anti-So in camp and seven years in exUe for his samvydav works, including a pamphlet viet" character. opposition to the government's violations tracing the position of women in Ukrain 3. Signing an open letter to the United of Soviet laws in the trials of dissidents ian history, was sentenced in April 1973 Nations as part of the "illegal Initiative and for his defense of Ukrainian nation to seven years strict-regime camp and five Group" (^Chronicle quoting official al integrity against Russification.6 years exUe. charge). Alekseevna Svetlichnaya was sentenced 4. "Anti-Soviet agitation" as evidenced Issue No. 30. to four years in camp and an unknown by the testimony of "witnesses" at the trial term in exile for possession of the writ Dated December 1973: who claimed Plyushch had carried on ings of former political prisoner Danilo such agitation in conversations he alleged •The Trial of P. Yakir and V. Krasin. Shumuk.4 Ivan Svetlichny, her husband. ly had with them. The materials on the Yakir-Krasin case Plyushch's case was tried in January assembled by the KGB investigators make 1973, and he was sent for compulsory up 150 volumes. According to the Chron 4. Danilo Shumuk was tried in Kiev in treatment to a "special psychiatric hos July 1972 and sentenced to ten years icle, more than 200 persons were called special-regime camp and five years exile. pital [hospitEil prison] in view of the social in for interrogation in connection with it. His crime was to have written memoirs danger of his anti-Soviet activities." (See The Chronicle lists the names of more of his experiences in prison camps. In Intercontinental Press, AprU 2, 1973, p. than 100. However, few were actually ar deed, he has had an adequate opportunity 374.) rested as a result of Yakir's or Krasin's to accumulate such experience. He served •Trial of Andrei Amalrik. In May eight years in Polish prisons for resisting 1973 Amalrik was to have completed his 5. Anatoly Marchenko, My Testimony Polish domination of Ukraine; twenty three-year term under an earlier con (New York: E. P. Dutton &Co., 1969), years in Stalin's camps for resistance to viction. He was convicted in 1970 for 415 pp. $8.85. Stalin's policies in Ukraine; and ten addi his book Will the Soviet Union Survive tional years as a result of a 1958 sen Until 19841 However, instead of releas 6. See The ChornovU Papers by Vyache tence. His case has been reported in pre ing him, the authorities brought charges slav Chornovil (New York: McGraw- vious issues of the Chronicle. against him under the same article of Hill), 246 pp. February 24, J975 testimony. The interrogations were appar hooliganism. The Chronicle states that tor and I know that mathematics has no ently merely another form of harassment. the "real reason for his arrest was A relation to medicine." The trial of Yakir and Krasin began Feldman's active participation in the Concern for Plyushch's life has August 27, 1973, and each was sentenced struggle for the right of emigration to Is prompted several appeals from Soviet dis to three years imprisonment and three rael." He received a sentence of three and sidents. years exile. In September 1973, in re a half years in camp. Vladimir Borisov carried out another sponse to an appeal, the Supreme Court •Trials of Vasily Lisovoy, Evgeny Pro- hunger strike in a Leningrad psychiatric of the USSR reduced Yakir's and Krasin's nyuk, and Ivan Semanyuk. These three hospital in the summer of 1973. He was prison terms to the time they had already Ukrainians were tried in November 1973 protesting against the forced injections he served during the investigation, and in in Kiev on charges of anti-Soviet activity was receiving. As a result of his protest, mid-October they were sent to serve their and received the following sentences: Liso the injections were discontinued. terms in exile. Yakir was sent to Kalinin, voy, seven years strict-regime camp and Borisov was sent for compulsory psy about 100 miles northwest of Moscow, three years exUe; Pronyuk, seven years chiatric treatment in 1969 because he Krasin was sent to Ryazan, about 115 strict-regime camp and five years exile; signed the Initiative Group's Appeal to miles southeast of Moscow.7 Semanyuk, four years strict-regime camp. the United Nations and a letter in defense Krasin's wife, Nadezhda Emelkina, who Lisovoy and Pronyuk worked in the In of Grigorenko. According to the Chronicle, was serving a five-year sentence received stitute of Philosophy of the Ukrainian a psychiatric commission reviewed Bori- in 1971 under Article 190, was pardoned. Academy of Science. The "crime" of all sov's case in the fall of 1973. During The text of the statement the Initiative three was their appeals to the authori the commission's interview with Borisov, Group for the Defense of Human Rights ties against the illegal arrests and trials he was asked whether he was in solidarity in the USSR issued in September 1973 in Ukraine and their role in the prepara with Solzhenitsyn's position. Borisov is printed in full. In this statement five tion of two numbers of the Ukrainian answered in the affirmative. The com members of the Group — Tatyana Vakika- Herald. mission resolved that he must continue nova, Sergei Kovalyov, A Levitin-Kras- to receive compulsory psychiatric treat nov, Grigory Podyapolsky, and Tatyana 9Investigation in the Case of Gabriel ment. Khodorovich — defend the group's pur Superfin. Superfin was arrested July 3, In June 1973 Andrei Sakharov and poses and activities against the charges 1973. A number of persons were inter Grigory Podyapolsky and Tatyana Kho leveled at them by the KGB in the course rogated in connection with his case. He dorovich appealed to the United Nations of the Yakir-Krasin case. They con evidently gave detailed testimony about in defense of both Borisov and Plyushch. demned the KGB's brutality in forcing the preparation and distribution of the %Events in Lithuania. Demonstrations Yakir £md Krasin to make false confes Chronicle of Current Events and his role took place in Kaunas in May 1973 on sions and false statements. in the distribution of other samizdat the first anniversary of the suicide of Ro •The Tried of Yuri Shikhanovich. He writings. mas Kalanta, who burned himself to was sentenced November 26, 1973, to 9In the Prisons and Camps. The death to protest Russian domination of compulsory treatment in a psychiatric Chronicle continued its practice of report Lithuanian life. The size of the demon hospital on charges of anti-Soviet activi ing on living conditions in camps, the strations was not reported. ty, i.e., possession and distribution of sa- names of prisoners in specific camps and The seventh and eighth issues of the mizdat He had been arrested in Septem prisons, the political prisoners' protest ac Chronicle of the Lithuanian Catholic ber 1972 and forced to undergo psychiat tivities, etc. This issue concentrates on the Church have appeared, dated August ric examinations. Concern over his wel Perm prison camp in the Ural Mountain 1973 and December 1973. According to fare during the long period he was held area of east central Russia. the summary of the contents of this jour incommunicado had prompted protests The nsunes of officials at various execu nal in the Chronicle of Current Events, from various dissidents.8 tive and administrative posts are listed. these new issues document the cases of •The Tried of Aleksandr Bolonkin and Factual accounts of prisoners who have repression of Catholics and of people sus Valery Balakirev. They were tried in Mos suffered and died because they were de pected of taking part in the preparation cow in November 1973 under Article 70, nied the necessary medical treatment and and distribution of the Lithuanian Catho specificeJly with preparing and distribut attention are also included. lic Church's Chronicle ing samizdat, e.g., the Chronicle of Cur Four Ukrainian women who are po A large-scale KGB offensive occurred rent Events, a journal called The Demo litical prisoners in the Dubrovlag camp in Lithuania in November 1973 with nu crat, and the leaflet signed "The Citizens' in Mordovia—Nina Strokatova, Nadezh merous searches conducted and many per Committee." (See Intercontinental Press, da Svetlichnaya, Stephany Shabatura, sons called in for questioning in connec July 3, 1972, p. 763.) Balakirev re and Irina Stasiv-Kalynets —went on a tion with Case No. 345 ("the preparation nounced his activities; Bolonkin did not. hunger strike in the fall of 1973. They of religious literature 'discrediting the So Balakirev received a five-year suspended demanded that Ivan Dzyuba visit their viet system,"' [the Chronicle of Current sentence; Bolonkin received a sentence of camp complex. Their hunger strike oc Events's, description of the case]). four years in camp and two years in exUe. curred before Dzyuba's recantation state The reports on the events in Lithuania •The Case of Aleksandr Feldman. ment was published in the official press. in the Chronicle of Current Events indi Feldman was arrested in October 1973 •7n the Psychiatric Hospitals. The cate that popular opposition is growing and tried in November on charges of physical condition of Leonid Plyushch de teriorated markedly in the fall of 1973 there. after he received forced injections of halo- (On the basis of the information that has appeared in the Chronicle, it is known 7. According to Issue No. 11 of A Chron peridol in the Dnipopetrovsk special psy that during the past two years Lithuania icle of Human Rights in the USSR both chiatric hospital. The Chronicle reports Yakir and Krasin have now been par the following statement by the doctor has been the scene of large-scale demon strations of young persons who denounce doned. "treating" Plyushch: "I have not yet de tected his'philosophical intoxication'. . . . the Kremlin's bureaucratic interference in 8. Shikhanovich has reportedly been re However, the patient has shown an in Lithuanian life and the Russification of leased. See Intercontinental Press, July 29, clination 'toward the mathematization of the Lithuanian Republic. The breadth of 1974, p. 1027. psychology and medicine.' I am a doc this opposition to Russification in Lithua-

Intercontinental Press nia is evidenced by the emergence of many for a so-called 'parasitic way of life.' In Dzyuba's recantation statement, which ap smali groups that study Lithuanian cul the section 'Who Am I,' statements on peared in the journai Literaturnaya ture and history. As the Chronicle re Jewish national self-awareness are pub Ukraina in November 1973. ported, the KGB has been attempting to lished based on the authors' personal ex On the final page of Issue No. 30 of disperse these groups, undoubtedly fear periences."( Chronicle No. 30, pp. 98 a I the Chronicle, the editors pledge that the ing that they will take a political direc 99.) journal will appear in 1974. And in fact tion. The Kremlin's fears as to the po The journal also publishes creative at least two 1974 issues have appeared. tential of these currents have apparently works of various kinds by Soviet Jews. Issue No. 31 is devoted to the struggie prompted intensified attacks on all insti of the Crimean Tatars to return to their tutions not directly under bureaucratic homeiand in the Crimea. This issue is control, including the Catholic Church. dated May 17, 1974, the thirtieth anni Church officials have responded to these versary of the night in 1944 when the en attacks by issuing petitions signed by tire Crimean Tatar population was forc thousands who demand that the bureau ibly deported to Central Asia by Stalin. cracy stop interfering in church life. Such Issue No. 32 is reportedly circulating in petitions have been reported in previous the Soviet Union. issues of the Chronicle. The reemergence of the Chronicle of (The emergence of the Chronicle of the Current Events is a victory for the demo Lithuanian Catholic Church is another cratic opposition in the USSR. On the manifestation of the church's resistance. basis of not only the information the The KCB's offensive in Lithuania against Chronicle contains but cdso from the very opponents of bureaucratic policies has on fact of the journal's renewed publication, ly fueled the fire. There is every reason it is clear that Stalin's heirs have failed to to believe that the situation in Lithuania silence protests and opposition to their to will become ever more explosive.) talitarian methods of rule, even though 9Materials on Sakharov. The Chronicle hi the regime's efforts toward this end have summarized the statements made by An been unrelenting and vicious. □ drei Sakharov in the fail of 1973 and the official press attacks on him that en sued. Included in the summary of these Strikes Sweep Nigeria episodes is a statement dated September 1973, i.e., at the height of the official Following a December 27 announce propaganda campaign against the physi ment of government recommendations for cist, from sixteen political prisoners who pay raises and other adjustments in the declared their solidarity with his efforts ANATOLYMARCHENKO civU service, Nigerian government em in support of civil rights in the USSR. ployees dissatisfied with the increases have (See Intercontinental Press, October 15, carried out a series of strikes at hospitals, 22, and 29, 1973.) 9 Short Communiques. Under this head banks, water and electricity services, oil 9Actions of Soviet Jews. The Chronicle ing the Chronicle presents brief accounts supplies, and the railways. Workers in the carries reports of the ongoing actions by of such individual cases as the regime's private sector, backed by their trade Jews — protests, hunger strikes, and so move to deprive Zhores Medvedev of his unions, have also struck to press for high on —in defense of the right of Jews to citizenship while he was in London in er wages and have demanded that the low emigrate. This activity, which is well August 1973, Andrei Sinyavsky's emigra est pay in the government scale become publicized abroad, was carried out con tion to France in 1973, and Anatoly Ya- the minimum wage. tinuously throughout 1972 and 1973. kobson's emigration to Israel in Septem The regime promised that none of the Out of this campaign has emerged a ber 1973. Yakobson was one of the found 750,000 civil-service employees would get samizdat journal entitled Jews in the ing members of the Initiative Croup in less than a 30 percent raise, and some USSR. Four issues have appeared, the 1969 and was the person who read the private companies made similar con cessions. first dated October 1972. eulogy at the funeral of the Old Bolshe vik Aleksei Kosterin in 1968. He had been Scores of workers have been arrested The Chronicle summarizes the contents the object of continuous threats and ha since the end of December on charges of this new journal: rassment from the KCB. of destroying "private property" or as a "In the general section of the collection, 9Samizdat News. Samizdat literature result of clashes with the police. General articles are published devoted to the prob is still circulating. This issue of the Chron Yakubu Cowon, the Nigerian head of lems of the national identification of Jews icle describes or summarizes eight items. state, blamed the strikes on "Ul-motivated in the USSR. In the first issue the socio They inciude an anonymous pamphiet elements" who were exploiting legitimate logical aspect of the question was exam defending Sakharov against the officiai demands in order to "precipitate a paraly sis of government authority." ined; in the second and third issues the attacks on him, Soizhenitsyn's "Peace and psychological and culturological prob Vioience" essay, and Anatoiy Marchenko's lems. In the fourth, the history of the So appeai to foreign "progressive social or viet Jews' loss of their language was ex ganizations" on the subject of the detente. amined. In the section 'Problems of Law' In addition, two foreign journals are When You Move... the first and third issues examine the legal reviewed —one put out by Amnesty In- position of Jews who want to resettle in ternationai containing writings of Soviet Don't count on the post office for Israel in connection with the absence in dissidents, and the other. Issue No. 3 warding your Intercontinental Press! the USSR of any written law guarantee of the emigre Chronicle of Human Rights It's against their rules. ing that right. In the second issue ma in the USSR. Send us your new address. And in terials are collected on the persecution 9Material in the Soviet Press. Included plenty of time, please. of Jews and other citizens in the USSR in this section is a summary of Ivan February 24, 1975 0^b /noDh o.c§\m /Oom^F^qy^^ »nmiq mmm iisii wmm ta□□□QQi.nc^Q £7aOD

Chino Cuts U. S. Grain Imports pany planned to ask for rate increases. of the Vietnam war are being recruited The Chinese government has canceled AT& T subsidiaries have also been to train the Saudi Arabian force. Salaries orders for 601,000 tons of U.S. wheat. charged with setting up secret political range from $1,500 to $1,800 a month, The cancellation, reported January 27 by funds In order to Influence candidates. with free housing. A former U. S. Army Cook Industries, one of the largest U. S. A company statement explained that its officer Insisted: "We eire not mercenaries grain-trading companies, affects about only Interest was "to encourage c top because we are not pulling the trriggers; two-thirds of the wheat scheduled for ship managers to voluntarily contribute to the we train people to pull triggers." ment to China through mld-1976. political process." The troops being trained are primarily China purchased three million tons of responsible for gueirding Saudi Arabian American wheat In the crop year ending U.S. Tuna Boots Seized In Ecuador oil fields. In June 1974, making It the largest foreign Three U. S. fishing vessels have been buyer of U. S. grain fai that period. This seized by the government of Ecuador, ac crop year, the Chinese contract represents Italian Judges Strike for Higher Pay cording to a report by a spokesman for only 22 million of the 1.1 billion bushels Four thousand of Italy's 7,000 judges the American Tunaboat Association Janu of wheat the U. S. plans to export went on a two-day strike beginning Feb ary 31. One of the boats was Identified Some analysts suggested that the can ruary 5 dememdlng higher pay. They are as being owned by the Del Monte Corpo cellation may reflect a better than expected seeking Increases of up to 20 percent to ration. Although Ecuador exercises a 200- wheat crop In China. bring their salaries up from the $600 to mile fishing limit off Its coast, Washington Others pointed out that Peking had re $1,800 a month they currently receive. refuses to recognize more than a twelve- jected a number of cargoes of American Their walkout, which was reported to mile limit wheat last year because of smut, a plant be the first strike by the judicial branch disease, found In the grain and may be of government In Italian history, forced wary of Importing, the disease. Moscow Resumes Arms Aid to Egypt the postponement of many trials. Although large grain sales to the Soviet Delivery of ammunition and spare parts Union had earlier been blamed for soar from the Soviet Union to Egypt has been 27 Chileans Exiled to Venezuela ing food prices In the United States, gov resumed In "Important quantities," ac Twenty-seven Chilean political prisoners ernment officials were quick to assert that cording to U. S., Israeli, and European were flown Into exUe In Venezuela Feb cancellation of the Chinese wheat orders Intelligence sources. ruary 13. Among them were five former would not bring lower prices. U. S. Secre Israeli sources claim that Egypt has officials of the Unldad Popular govern tary of Agriculture Earl Butz explained, received four shiploads of military sup ment Anselmo Sule, president of the Radi "If you take all the wheat out of a one- plies since the beginning of the year. But cal party; Carlos Morales Abarzua, a pound loaf of bread that sells for 40 they say that any new shipments of heavy leader of the Radical party and a former cents, you're only taking away about 5 military equipment, particularly aircraft, deputy; Hugo Miranda, a leader of the cents." were made conditional on a return of Radical party and former senator; Jaime Soviet military advisers to Egypt. Soviet Toha, minister of agriculture; and Carlos AT&T Admits Bugging Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko re Jorquera Tolosa, an Allende press portedly laid down these terms when he 30 Million Phone Calls attache. The twenty-seven persons are part of a The American Telephone and Tele met with Egyptian President Sadat In group of fifty scheduled to be exiled In graph Company Is the largest privately early February. Venezuela. owned corporation In the world. As befits Egypt would require approximately 200 high-performance fighters and a concern of that size, AT&T also ran fighter-bombers to challenge the Israeli the world's most extensive bugging opera Tito Presses Drive Against Dissidents air force, according to Israeli estimates. tion. The company admitted February 2 The Tito regime's recent dismissal of that It had monitored thirty million long eight dissident professors at the Univer distance phone calls between 1965 and Fox Sent to Guard Coop? sity of Belgrade may be followed by a similar purge at Ljubljana University. 1970. The VlnneU Corporation of Los Angeles The leadership of the League of Com "I don't think we did anything Illegal," has landed a $77 mUIion contract from munists of Slovenia has Issued a state one executive said. He claimed the surveil the U. S. Defense Department to train four ment calling on party members In the lance was necessary "to protect the Integ battalions of Saudi Arabian troops dur university's faculty of sociology, political rity of our network and to keep people ing the next three years. Although private sciences, and journalism "to get engaged from cheating." No Information was given American companies have In the past In doing away with Ideological and po on whether the cost of the bugging was been given government contracts to help litical deviations at that Institution of high Included In the phone bill. U. S.-backed foreign Mmles with logistics er learning." In a further development, government and maintenance tasks, this Is the first The parly said that "according to Its Investigators have begun looking Into such contract for combat training to be analysis, the faculty has been turning Into charges that Southwestern Bell, an AT&T made public. an Ideological stronghold of technocratic subsidiary, tapped the telephones of city Several hundred former members of the and llberallstlc forces, with concepts and officials In communities where the com U. S. Special Forces and other veterans theories alien to Socialist self-management

Intercontinental Press and Marxism." ty were being scheduled for dep'^'^tation. four-month decline exceeded the worst four "Socialist self-managemenf is the term Twenty-nine Haitians whose appea^o were months in the 1957-58 recession, pre the Tito regime uses to describe its own denied disappeared from their Montreal viously the sharpest postwar slump in the brand of Stalinism. homes, going underground rather than economy. The dissidents, the statement said, be returned to the Duvalier dictatorship. The report noted that automobile pro "would press for bourgeois or bureaucrat In Toronto, the Haitian Defense Com duction dropped an additional 10 per ic-statist ideas and make it possible for mittee, comprising fifteen organizations, cent in January to an annual rate of the world's reactionary forces to interfere has called for a demonstration on May 10 only 4.8 million units. A year ago, auto in our domestic affairs." in solidarity with the Haitian Immigrants. manufacturers were projecting annual The dissidents the regime is worried An appeal has been circulated in Que sales of between 10 and 10.5 million units. about, however, don't believe anything bec demanding "that the Canadian gov of the sort. They have criticized the regime ernment immediately adopt a special hu Sentences Reduced for Carabanchel 10 for not practicing the workers control it manitarian measure to stop the deporta Franco's Supreme Court rejected an ap claims to uphold. All are Marxists and tion of the Haitians." It was signed by, peal to set aside the convictions of the anti-Stalinists. among others, the Canadian Labour Carabanchel 10, but on February 15 it The party statement said that four pro Congress, the three Quebec trade-union reduced their twelve- to twenty-year sen fessors at Ljubljana University are under federations, the Canadian Council of tences. particular scrutiny. It identified them as Churches, and the Canadian Civil Lib The ten were arrested in June 1972 Vladimir Arzensek, Tine Mribar, Janez erties Association. when police raided a Catholic church in Jerovsek, and Veljko Rus. the suburbs of Madrid. They were charged In a related development, it has been with "illegal association" as a result of reported that the government has cut off U.S., Too, Sends Haitians their alleged membership in the outlawed a subsidy to Praxis, the only legal pub Bock' to Duvalier Regime Workers Commissions, and were accused lication in Yugoslavia that frequently crit The U.S. government has deported nine of belonging to the national coordinating icizes the government and party. Pub Haitians, and 400 more in the Miami committee of the commissions. lished by dissidents at Zagreb University, area are threatened with deportation de They were originally sentenced at a trial Praxis has long served as the main or spite their pleas that they are political ref in December 1973 that attracted world gan for the Marxist opposition in Yugo ugees. They are among 1,000 refugees wide attention. Franco's prime minister. slavia. The attack, which is expected to from the Duvalier dictatorship who Admiral Carrero Blanco, was assas force an end to its publication, may sig have arrived in Florida in the last two sinated on the day the trial opened. nal the beginning of a new campaign years. U.S. immigration officials claim The reduced sentences now range from against dissidents in Zagreb. there are 50,000 "illegal aliens," mostly two years and four months to six years. As part of its growing effort to sup from the Caribbean area or Latin Amer Four of the ten were released from pri press dissent, the regime recently passed ica, now living in Dade County, which son immediately, having already spent a law prohibiting "spreading of false news" includes Miami. more time in jaU than their reduced sen and "disparaging of the state organs." The deportation ruling against the tences called for. Nine of the prisoners An amendment now before the Serbian Haitians has been in the courts since soon had been on a hunger strike since the Assembly would extend the ban to cover after the arrival of the first group in De court took up their appeal on February "hostile outbursts" at public gatherings, cember 1972, and the test cases against family religious feasts (!), in shops, pub 11. the 400 could take another year or more lic buses, and even in private apartments. An extensive campaign for freedom for to resolve. Meanwhile, the Haitians are all political prisoners is now under way unemployed, since they have been denied throughout Spain. About 160,000 signa Clash Between Liberation Forces authorization to work while their cases tures have been gathered on a petition to Reported in Angolan Capital are tied up in the courts. Franco. Among the signers are said to Yet an immigration official interviewed Several persons were reported killed or be 2,000 members of the armed forces. by the New York Times said "illegal wounded in Luanda February 12-13 in aliens" are "taking jobs from our Ameri fighting between the liberation forces. Ac can citizens." 'Thermometer of Fear' cording to the Portuguese news agency, A lawyer active in the defense of the The number of $50 and $100 bills in the clashes involved forces of the MPLA Haitians noted the difference in treatment circulation in the United States increased (Movimento Popular de Libertacao de An by the immigration service of these Black markedly in 1974, rising to a total of gola— People's Movement for the Libera refugees from a right-wing dictatorship nearly $27 billion. tion of Angola) and those of Daniel Cbi- and the welcome accorded to white Cu Some experts say inflation is the pri penda, a former leader of the MPLA. bans, who now comprise about 50 per mary factor behind the increase. "If you Cbipenda was excluded from the coali cent of the county's population of 1.4 want to go to a restaurant and pay in tion regime of three liberation movements million. cash," one bank economist explained, "a and the Portuguese that took office in $20 bill is no good." Angola January 31. Others attributed much of the rise to U.S. Slump in Output hoarding. The increase of large denom Ottawa Deports Haitian Refugees Worst Since 1937 ination bUls is a "thermometer of fear," The Canadian government is continuing U. S. industrial production showed an Edwin Yeo, vice-chairman of the Pitts its moves to deport up to 1,500 Haitian exceptionally huge decline of 3.6 percent burgh National Bank, told reporters. refugees, despite protests from trade in January following, a drop of 3.1 per "It reflects the desire to hold large quan unions, churches, civil-liberties groups, cent in December, the Federal Reserve tities of currency in mattress form rath and political figures. Board reported February 13. er than in the other investment and sav According to the Canadian revolution The figure confirmed that the United ings vehicles. . . . These are difficult, even ary-socialist fortnightly Labor Challenge, States is in its deepest recession since tumultuous times, and this is the way by the end of December the Immigration World War II. It was the highest one- in which people react to these times." department bad rejected appeals against month drop in output since December In the past, hoarding of currency oc deportation by 116 Haitians. Of these, 1937. curred in the United States during the sixty-four were deported, three were ap Industrial production has dropped 9.5 Depression, the second world war, the prehended in the United States, and twen percent since September 30, 1974. This Korean war, and the Cuban missile crisis. February 24, ]975 Despliegan Tanques Contra Multitudes en Lima

Explosion Popular Socude Regimen Peruono Por Gerry Foley

[La siguiente es una traduccion del evito que se hiciera mds dano con la estab a en ruinas.'" artlculo "Popular Outburst Shakes intervencion de los tanqqes T-55, re La multitud no se amedrento ni si- Peru's Military Regime", publicado en cientemente adquiridos en la Union quiera con el fuego asesino de las Intercontinental Press el 17 de Sovi^tica. tropas, segiin Kandell. febrero]. "Los tanques que fueron enviados "Convoyes armados y tanques arra- a la plaza central en la tarde, dis- saban periodicamente el drea del cen persaron a los amotinados disparan- tro y mds alld de la Plaza San Mar do sus ametralladoras al aire en la tin. Despuds de que los soldados dis- mayoria de las ocasiones. Las .'i- pararon sus rifles automdticos y sus Tropas peruanas apoyadas por bulancias recogieron a varias per- granadas lacrimbgenas, las ambu- tanques, tomaron por asalto uno de sonas apararentemente heridas de lancias que seguian de cerca recogian los principales cuarteles generates de bala." a los muertos y a los heridos. la policia en Lima, el 5 de febrero, En un comunicado del 6 de febre "Pero los jovenes se reagrupaban para aplastar la huelga de los "de- ro, Kandell dijo que empleados de la tan pronto como pasaban los solda fensores del or den." morgue municipal informaron a los dos." "Hubo un mimero no conocido de reporter OS que alrededor de cincuenta Algunos informes afirmaron que la bajas entre soldados y policias, cuan- caddveres con impactos de bala ha- policia le dio su apoyo al rdgimen do los tanques, recientemente adqui- bian sido traidos desde que empeza- cuando vieron que los enfrentamien ridos en la Union Sovi^tica, se lan- ron los enfrentamientos. tos se extendieron. zaron contra los cuarteles de la po La Junta decreto un toque de queda "Al atardecer, el conflicto con la licia", inform6 un comunicado desde de las 22 del 5 de febrero hasta las Guardia Civil, una fuerza nacional Lima del 6 de febrero aparecido en 5 de la manana del 6 de febrero. Un policiaca paramilitar con 20,000 el Washington Post. toque de queda de las 22 a las 5 miembros, parecia haber sido resuel- El ataque militar contra los poli de la manana, siguio operando en to," informo un comunicado del 5 de cias en huelga provoco una explo los dias siguientes. febrero del Washington Post. sion de masas que el ej6rcito trato La policia politica allano las ofici "Pelotones de policias anti motines de sofocar abriendo fuego indiscri- nas de la agenda noticiosa Reuters con sus oficiales reaparecieron en las minadamente. clausurdndola. El gobierno la acuso calles de Lima para ayudar a las "Cuando se extendio la noticia del de "esparcir rumores." patrullas militares a reprimir, segiin asalto militar, miles de jovenes se con- informes de amplias [confrontaciones, glomeraron en las calles del centro El 8 de febrero, el gobierno con- hecho que] mostro que habia una so- de la ciudad," informb en un cable fisco 50,000 ejemplares del mimero lucion." el corresponsal del New York Times, especial de Caretas, de hecho la linica Por otro lado, habia rumores de Jonathan Kandell, desde la capital publicacion independiente que queda- una division en el ej6rcito. peruana. ba en el pals. El mimero especial "La cantidad relativamente pequena "Despu6s de haber volteado auto estaba dedicado a los enfrentamientos. de soldados en el centro hoy— a pesar buses, automoviles y camiones, sa- Los periodicos controlados por el de que el saqueo de tiendas con- quearon e incendiaron el club de ofi- gobierno, que censuraban las noticias tinuaba—le di6 validez a los rumores ciales en la plaza central." sobre el desarrollo de la crisis y de- sobre una posible querella entre los La lucha entre los dos sectores de fendian servilmente al regimen, fueron dirigentes militares," escribio Jonathan las fuerzas represivas del estado le los blancos predilectos de las masas Kandell el 6 de febrero. Tambidn se- dio a la multitud de gente pobre de- enardecidas. flal6: sesperada que vive en la ciudad, la "Un ejecutivo de Correo y Ojo [dos "El Presidente Juan Velasco Alva- oportunidad de tomar lo que quisie- periodicos importantes] dijo que tres rado, que se enfrenta a la crisis mhs ran de las tiendas y de atacar los soldados trataron de proteger el edi- grande desde que dirigib sus fuerzas odiados simbolos del privilegio. ficio en contra de cientos de mani armadas a la toma del poder con ". . . los amotinados cometieron ac- festantes, disparando al aire," inform6 un golpe de estado sin derramamiento tos de vandalismo en las tiendas Kandell en su comunicado del 6 de de sangre en 1968, no se ha dlrigido menos protegidas," prosiguio Kan- febrero. a la nacibn por medio de la televisibn deU, "apedrearon hoteles e incendia "'Cuando los soldados hicieron uso o la radio desde que empezaron los ron las oficinas de los periodicos con- de sus arm as,' dijo el ejecutivo Augus- disturbios." trolados por el gobierno. El humo to Razuri, 'la multitud rocio gasolina Despu6s de los primeros enfrenta se esparcia por el centro de la ciudad. en las oficinas y despues algunos mientos, el gobierno suspendib las "Manifestantes tambi^n apedrearon arrojaron trapos encendidos. A las garantias constitucionales. Esta sus la Embajada de los Estados Unidos, 2:30 de la tarde, para cuando lle- pension mds tarde fue extendida por rompiendo mds de 40 ventanas. Se garon los bomberos, el edificio ya un periodo de treinta dias. Tambi^n

Intercontinental Press ordenb que todos los lugares de tra- portente y llena de contradicciones. y su brazo derecho, y continub bro- bajo y los negocios se cerraran. El "Sinamos," escribio Niedergang, "es un tando profusamente por varios minu 8 de febrero, la United Press Interna aparato pesado burocr^itico, al que tos hasta que llegb la ambulancia." tional inform6 que las cortes militares critican los mismos partidarios del Pero ni siquiera la masacre podia habian empezado a juzgar a las 1,300 gobierno, que nunca ha logrado crear detener a las masas empobrecidas que personas arrestadas durante los en- las condiciones para un apoyo popu veian por primera vez la oportuni- frentamientos y que seesperaban aun lar masivo." dad de tener las cos as que siempre m&s arrestos. Al fin de cuentas, Sinamos parece habian estado m&s allh de sus posi- "Policias y soldados fuertemente ar- que lo unico que ha logrado es estar bilidades. mados irrumpieron en cantidad de lo suficientemente cerca a las masas "A pesar del fuego despiadado de los casas y departamentos en busca del como para convertirse en un bianco tanques, los amotinados continuaban bo tin obtenido por la turba en- a la mano de los primeros disturbios el saqueo. Un jbven salib corriendo furecid a. a nivel general causados por la frus- de una tienda de ropa con una caja "Se esperaba que el numero de de- tracion y la rabia hacia la demagogia llena de camisas bajo su brazo, otro tenidos aumentara con los arrestos del regimen. se apoderb de un montbn de trajes. llevados a cabo por soldados, ar- El intento de la junta peruana de Un poco despu^s, una familia salib mados con ametralladoras, de hom- hacer reformas de arriba a abajo y de una tienda con una televisibn. 'Las bres en cuyos hogares se encuentre de mantener el balance entre las tiendas estdn de oferta, amigo', me mercancia rob ad a." masas pobres y el capitalismo nacio- gritb un hombre mientras corria con Se vio claro que la "junta progre- nal y el imperialismo parece estar un montbn de pantalones." sista" se enfrento a una explosion al borde de terminar en desastre. Ese La huelga de la policia coincidib popular bastante extensa que pone fue la conclusion que saco el experto con un aumento en el descontento. en dud a su existencia. Y el hecho de en America Latina de Le Monde de que haya reaccionado a la moviliza- los enfrentamientos de principios de "Detrhs de los problemas actuales del gobierno esth un promedio de in- ci6n popular como cualquier otro febrero en la capital peruana. flacibn que Uegb al 22 por ciento el gobierno burgu^s, inmisericorde en la Dadas las contradicciones del re defensa de la "sacrosanta" propiedad gimen militar "progresivo", es dificil ano pasado, un porcentaje demasiado privada, solo va a debilitar mds su determinar con precision si el impulso alto para lo que esth acostumbrado Peru," escribib KandeU el 5 de febre posicibn politica. inicial de estas explosiones vino de ro: "Con los precios en constante "Lima es un barril de polvora," es- las masas pobres o de las fuerzas aumento, los obreros fabriles, los mi- cribio Marcel Niedergang en Le pro imperialistas. Lo que es seguro neros, y los empleados publicos ban Monde del 7 de febrero. "La mitad es que los enfrentamientos arm ados llevado a cabo huelgas en las ultimas de la poblacibn vive en barriadas, entre la policia en huelga y el ej^rcito semanas." suburbios de chozas hechas de lona dio lugar a una explosion desde Tambibn se han dado signos, ya y carton. El desempleo, el subdesa- ab ajo. desde hace algun tiempo, de que la rrollo y un 'lumpen proletariado' en Las masas que se enfrentaron al junta empezaba a ceder a la presibn la capital peruana, siempre dispuesto ej6rcito el 5 de febrero no fueron tra- del imperialismo mundial. Joseph a los disturbios y los saqueos, son los tadas con el guante de seda que la Novitski recopilb una serie de ejem- factores que tienen que tomarse en junta usa para lidiar con los dere- plos en el Washington Post del 26 cuenta para poder apreciar los even- chistas. Tampoco fueron tratados de tos del 5 de febrero. Los objetivos que la manera que el gobierno de Allende de enero. "'Las revoluciones en nuestro tiem escogieron los amotinados tambidn en Chile trat6 a las manifestaciones son importantes—las oficinas de los de la derecha que prepararon el cami- po han tenido que aprender a punta periddicos que fueron 'socializados' el no para su derrocamiento. de tropiezos, que nada es gratuito atlo pasado, el club de los oficiales, en este mundo,' dijo el peribdico gu- los grandes hoteles en el centro de Eduardo Ascarrunz, corresponsal bernamental cuando recientemente la ciudad, y sobre todo, las oficinas de Reuters, estuvo en medio de la fueron concedidos los cuantiosospr^s- de Sinamos, el organismo guberna- balacera. Quiza fueron sus informes tamos del extranjero para un pro- mental encargado de 'mobilizar ener- los que empujaron a la junta a cerrar yecto minero con un retraso de cinco gias' en apoyo al regimen." esa agenda. Escribib: "Un joven con anos. Sinamos fue confeccionado para un pantalbn nuevo en sus manos ya- "Esos pr^stamos pueden servir para funcionar mds o menos como funcio- cia en la Plaza de San Martin, mien- hacer un estudio de como los diri- nan los aparatos partidario y sindi- tras que los tanques rociaban con gentes militares de la revolucibn cal en los paises stalinistas, es decir, balas de ametraUadora la plaza. peruana se dieron cuenta de las limi- que sirva como un anillo de trans- Cerca de d yacian otros dos jbvenes taciones de su nacionalismo y tuvie- mision que permita al gobierno ex que habian sido alcanzados por las ron que aceptar, en contra de su tender su control directo, profunda- balas de los soldados. Las ambulan- voluntad, la forma en que funcionan mente, en las masas. Sin embargo, cias llegaron. Varios minutos des- las finanzas en el mundo no-comu- la "organizacion de masas" del go pu6s, los amotinados salieron de una nista. bierno peruano no tiene la consisten- tienda a la plaza. Fueron barridos "Aunque nadie aqui lo admite piibli- cia politica ni las raices sociales del por las balas. Otras dos personas camente, hay evidencias que revelan aparato burocr&tico stalinista. Es la cayeron bajo una lluvia de plomo. que para poder financiar los 620 creacion desvencijada de una junta Un joven se desplomo a unas cuan- millones de dblares que se necesitaban bonapartista burguesa, no solamente tas metros de mi, cerca de la caseta. para la mina de cobre Cuajone, el torpe y burocrdtica, sino tambi6n im- La sangre brotaba de su garganta gobierno tuvo que ceder al menos en February 24, 1975 parte, sus previas decisiones mAs na- gobierno, y despues de las reformas Muchos de los experimentos del go cionalistas." quizh mfts grandes Uevadas a cabo bierno, que recibieron gran publici- Durante cinco anos, la junta se ha en los ultimos anos por un gobierno dad sobre la "democracia industrial" negado a pagarle compensacion a burgu6s en America Latina (con ex- en realidad fueron disenados con el Exxon per la nacionalizacion de su cepcion de Chile cuando el gobierno propbsito de atar a los obreros a los sucursal peruana, que fue intervenida de Allende, funcionando dentro del planes del rbgimen para desorrollar poco despues del goipe que instauro contexto de la democracia parlamen- una economia burguesa moderna. en el poder al actual gobierno. Du taria, fue obligado por la presion de "Dirigentes sindicales establecidos rante esos cinco anos la junta no las masas a ir mucho mhs all6. de desconfian de la idea de la comuni- pudo conseguir los pr6stamos que lo que tenia pensado), la junta dad industrial porque tienen miedo solicito. El 19 de diciembre de 1974, peruana parece que ahora ha sido de que les reste poder," escribio Everett los Estados Unidos asignaron parte totalmente abandonada por las G. Martin el 4 de febrero en el Wall del fondo de 76 millones de dolares masas. Street Journal. "En realidad, aunque para compensar a Exxon por otras "Los observadores han notado el los funcionarios no lo dicen piiblica- propiedades nacionalizadas. El re vacio politico que existe en el pais," mente, hay claros indicios de que esto gimen peruano no hizo nada. El 7 senalo Le Monde el 8 de febrero. es lo que tiene en mente el gobierno. de enero, fueron anunciados los nueve "Ningiin sector de la poblacibn civil 'En privado,' observb un diplomhtico, pr6stamos, y se supo que una de las ha mostrado su apoyo al r6gimen 'los funcionarios del gobierno dicen instituciones que prestaban el dinero del Presidente Velasco Alvarado con que los sirdicatos no tienen raz6n era el U.S. Export-Import Bank excepcion de la Confederacion Gene para existir. Su verdadera intencibn [Banco de Exportacion-Importacibn ral de Trabajadores controlada por el es reemplazarlos, porque si son sin- de los Estados Unidos]. Partido Comunista." dicatos marxistas, entonces represen- Para poder seguir jugando la fun- tan la lucha de clases, y si son m&s "Ha habido otros casos en que los ci6n de balancear a las masas y al tradicionales, entonces representan el militares nacionalistas peruanos ban imperialismo, la junta ha tenido que proceso capitalista de negociar.'" tenido que ceder al mundo exterior," reprimir toda actividad politica inde- Al final de este articulo en el prin senalo tambi^n Novitski. "Los con- pendiente y ha debido desmovilizar a cipal periodico de finanzas en los tratos firmados con dieciocho com- los trabajadores. De otra manera, Estados Unidos, Martin cit6 a "un panias excavadoras extranjeras en las hubiera corrido el riesgo de que las ejecutivo norteamericano" que lleva a junglas del Amazonas en Peru han reformas iniciaran un proceso que no cabo sus operaciones en Peru sobre sido criticados por los opositores se pudiera controlar, un proceso que este tema: "Es una experiencia nueva exiliados del gobierno, que dicen que llevado a una confrontacibn decisiva en negocios para mi, y como usted favorece a las companias mhs de lo de las fuerzas fundamentales de la comprenderh, me parece un reto in- que es necesario en el mundo actual sociedad como sucedio en Chile. teresante." sediento de petroleo." Sin embargo, a pesar de la debili- dad del nacionalismo de la junta, no hay la menor duda de que los impe- rialistas creyeron que much as de las medidas del regimen dab an un "mal ejemplo" que en un momento dado tenian que ser "desalentadas." Sobre todo, desde que se dio el goi pe militar en Chile, en 1973, con el To help celebrate the tenth anni apoyo de los Estados Unidos, la versary of Intercontinental Press, junta se ve cada vez mhs presionada reproductions of sketches by Co- por las fuerzas pro imperialistas. Aiin pain, artist for Intercontinental mds, el regimen nacionalista deca- Press, were published by the New dente en Lima seria un primer bianco York Local of the Socialist Workers Ibgico para la contraofensiva de los party and bound in an 8.5" x 11" Estados Unidos, instigados por la re- book. The aim was to use the money cesion, en contra de los paises pro- gained from soles to help us begin ductores de materia prim a." publishing articles in Spanish. "Los dirigentes peruanos no pueden The drawings, of various sizes, in esperar una actitud comprensiva por clude portraits of Hugo Blanco, Mal parte de Washington," escribio Nieder- colm X, James P. Cannon, Che gang en Le Monde el 7 de febrero. Guevara, Cesar Chavez, Leon "Todo lo contrario. Todo, empezando Trotsky, and many more, some of por la designacion de un embajador which ore suitable for framing. de 'mano dura' para Lima, indica A limited number of copies of this que los Estados Unidos no harhn collection of drawings are now nada para evitar la caida de uno Malcolm X available for only $5. de los ultimos gobiernos naciona listas en America Latina." Intercontinental Press P. O. Box 116, Village Station New York, NY 10014 Despu6s de mhs de cinco anos de

Intercontinental Press Durante los ultimos cinco anos, las burocrbtica copiada de los stalinistas, v6s de la Corporacibn Venezolana de huelgas tanto de maestros como de parece ya no tener efecto para darle Guayana. Durante 1975, ellas cobra- trabajadores industriales ban sido apoyo a lo que se ba convertido, pare rbn altisimas comisiones por traba- brutalmente reprimidas. Los diri- los stalinistas, en el principal modelo jar para el Estado. Y esto no es un gentes que intentaron defender los in- internacional de una "revolucion de- gasto necesario. tereses de las masas en contra del mocrbtica progresiva." c) Y continuarbn en el pais dan- gobierno, tales como el dirigente re- Solo las fuerzas genuinamente re- do asistencia t^cnica basta 1977. Esta volucionario de las sindicatos cam- volucionarias que ban permanecido es otra parte superflua del acuerdo pesinos, Hugo Blanco, ban sido leales a la clase obrera y a las masas en beneficio de las compabias, pues expulsados arbitrariamente de su pro- empobrecidas del Peru podrian con- la inmensa mayoria del personal t^c- pio pals. vencer al pueblo de movilizarse en nico de la Orinoco y la Iron es vene- Abora tal parece que el apoyo de contra de un golpe derecbista. zolano. toda la izquierda oportunista, desde d) El Estado se compromete a su- el partido Comunista basta los anti- Si el gobierno y la izquierda en rea- ministrar a la US Steel, que es la guos dirigentes de la guerrilla, no lidad quieren detener la intervencion casa matriz de la Orinoco y que re pueden salvar al regimen, si los im- imperialista en los asuntos internos side en los Estados Unidos, 11 mi perialistas deciden que ya es tiempo del Peru, deben de inmediato anular llones de toneladas de bierro basta de derrocarlo. Ante los ojos de las la expulsion de Hugo Blanco. El es el 1981, tonelaje que podrb ser redu- masas empobrecidas se ba convertido linico dirigente en que las masas mbs cido basta un 50% a partir de esta en gobierno represivo, defensor de los oprimidas y explotadas aiin confian, fecba. Este es uno de los aspectos privilegios. Estas masas peruanas el que personifica las esperanzas de mbs graves de las Actas-Convenio, parece que no estbn dispuestas a es- un "nuevo Peru," y que puede movi- porque obligan a Venezuela a ven perar ya mbs para que se les mejore lizarlas, independ ten tern ente del go der gran parte del bierro que no po- su nivel de vida tal como se les pro- bierno, contra las fuerzas de la reac- drb ser transformado aqui. Y, por metib. La demagogia de izquierda y cion. □ si fueran pocas las desgracias, el go bierno de CAP piensa realizar esa transformacion del bierro a braves de empresas que incluyan a los capitalis- Nacionalizacion del Hierro en Venezuela tas, es decir, al capital privado, a los patronos. e) Segun las Actas-Convenio los conflictos que aparezcan durante la negociacion entre el Estado y las com Respuesta de la Ligo Sociciista pabias imperialistas, serbn resueltos, sin que nadie pueda protestar sus de- [La siguiente es una transcripcion Bias despu^s del Decreto Num. 580, cisiones, por una "Junta de Arbitros del articulo "Respuesta Socialista a el gobierno llevo al Congreso, para Arbitradores" formada por tres per- la Nacionalizacion del Hierro", pu- que fueron discutidas alii, el conteni- sonas. iQui^n nombra a esta 'jun blicado el 15 de enero en Voz So do real del acuerdo con la Iron y ta"? 6 No lo sabemos. Nosotros cree- cialista, drgano de la Liga Socialista, la Orinoco. A este acuerdo se le pu- mos que quien debe decidir cualquier organizacibn trotskista de Venezuela]. so el nombre de Actas-Convenio, y conflictc entre el Estado y las com representan graves concesiones a esas pabias es una comisibn de trabaja compaftias en contra de los intereses dores del bierro, elegida democrbti- de los trabajadores y el pueblo. camente en las minas y en los sin La industria del bierro, que duran Veamos, para comprobarlo, lo que dicatos. te anos estuvo explotada por y en ba quedado establecido en las Actas- Cuando las Actas-Convenio, que ba- beneficio de las companias imperialis- Convenio. Y ba quedado establecido bian sido secretamente negociadas, tas Iron y Orinoco Mining Company, asi, sin que los 3,500 trabajadores fueron llevadas al Parlamento, se ini- ba sido nacionalizada por medio del del bierro bayan sido siquiera consul- ci6 una acalorada discusion que ter- Decreto Presidencial Num. 580, en cu- tados. AUi se dice: min6 con una votacion sorprendente. yo primer articulo se lee: "Se reserva a) El Estado se compromete a in- Mientras los adecosi Arturo Her al Estado, por razones de convenien- demnizar a la Iron y a la Orinoco nandez Grisanti y David Morales Be- cia nacional, la industria de la explo- por un monto total de unos 500 mi- Uo usaron su retbrica en defensa del tacion de mineral de bierro.: Durante llones de bolivares, que es exactamen- gobierno, de las Actas-Convenio y de esos aflos de expoliacibn, ambas em- te lo que esas compabias ban exi- la gestion adeca a lo largo y ancbo presas obtuvieron en dos veces y me gido al Estado. 6 No ban rob ado al de su bistoria, . . . los copeyanos,2 dia el monto de su inversion de ca pais lo suficiente las companias co con Godofredo Gonzdlez y Eduardo pital, lo que significa que esos inmen- mo para que encima les regalemos Fernbndez a la cabeza, se lanzaron sos beneficios los sustrajeron de nues- 500 millones? 6 No se podria inver- a una santa cruzada en la que Ue- tro pais explotando brutalmente a los tir esta cantidad de dinero en un fon- trabajadores mineros. do inicial para imponer un seguro Pero tambi^n en el caso de esta al desempleado? 1. Miembros de Accibn Democrbtica. nacionalizacion, Carlos Andrbs P6rez b) Tanto la Orinoco como la Iron ba demostrado que ni puede ni quiere continuarbn operando en Venezuela, 2. Miembros del Comity Organizado romper sus lazos con el imperialismo. por un abo, para el Estado, a tra- por Elecciones Independientes. February 24, 1975 garon a los extremes de afirmar que Los companeros del MAS, ni vota- go, y que impusieron, durante diez 'la nacionalizacion del hierro es un ron en contra, ni denunciaron el mon- anos, el injusto bloqueo contra Cuba; engano." to de las indemnizaciones que Carlos una medida qqe golpea a un sector, Hasta aqui, por supuesto, no hay Andrds Pdrez pagard a las compa- (el de la US Steel) del imperialismo nada para sorprenderse. Copei y Ac- nias imperialistas. Con otra absten- yanqui. cion Democrhtica buscan salvar o de Segundo, los socialistas rechazamos fender su prestigio ante los electores. las Actas-Convenio firmadas por el Lo que realmente sorprende es la gobierno y las empresas Orinoco y actitud de la izquierda. Iron, porque atan a Venezuela duran A1 menos, el MIR vot6 en contra te varios aftos mhs, a las mismas de ese acuerdo entreguista, al que empresas que acaban de ser nacio- bautizaron con el sugestivo nombre naliz adas. de Actas-Convenio. Tercero, los socialistas proponemos Pero Am6rico Martin no levantb al- que toda la industria que tiene que ternativa clasista alguna frente a las ver con la transformacion del mineral proposiciones de Accibn Democrdtica; de hierro est6 en manos del Estado, no ayudb al movimiento obrero y y no, como promete el Presidente, en popular — apoydndose en el curul par- poder de los patronos a trav6s de lamentario—a avanzar en com- las empresas de capital mixto (estatal prender qud significa esta nacionaliza y privado). cion y qud pueden hacer los trabaja- Cuarto, los socialistas proponemos dores para hacer que los beneficios al MAS, al MIR, a la CTV,3 a las que de ella se desprendan, beneficien organizaclones estudiantiles, a los al pueblo. partidos que se reclaman obreros y Al mismo tiempo que la propagan populares, que iniciemos juntos una da gubernamental llenaba los oidos y campana por el control obrero de la la vista de todos con palabras y pan- industria del hierro. cartas, como aqueUa de que "el hie Nuestro punto de vista es que el so rro es nuestro", y la otra aseguran- cialismo no tuvo voz propia en esta do que 'los hijos de Bolivar recu- discusibn, ni en el Congreso, ni en peran su cerro", iqud decian los com- las fhbricas, ni en la calle; opinamos paneros del MAS, ademds de abste- que decenas de miles de jbvenes y tra nerse en el Congreso? bajadores esthn, como lo estamos no En Una resolucion firmada por la sotros, totalmente defraudados por direccibn del MAS, ellos realizan una ANDRES PEREZ que el MAS se limitb a lamentarse apreciacion que nos parece justa. sobre algunos aspectos de las Actas Dicen: Convenio y, a continuacion, levantb "Resulta retbrico preguntarse al ser- ci6n, la del Partido Comunista, quie- su mano en el Parlamento para vicio de qu6 modo de vida estard nes dicen representar a la clase obre- abstenerse. la explotacibn del hierro. Es obvio ra y al socialismo, no hicieron otra Esta campana se centraria inmedia- que ella formard parte, por ahora, de cosa que dar un apoyo indirecto y tamente en Uamar a asambleas de los un mecanismo economico caracteriza- vergonzante al acuerdo antiobrero y seis sindicatos de esa industria para do por el dominio de poderosos in- antisocialista al que llegaron el Presi- que los trabajadores eligieran demo- tereses privados (nacionales y extran- dente y las companias. cr&ticamente a una delegacibn obrera jeros) que en el hierro encontrardn Entre los activistas de algunas fa- a la que se debe asignar las siguien- un punto de apoyo importante para la bricas, hemos escuchado el siguiente tes funciones: a) Sustituir a la "Junta expansibn de sus negocios y sus ga- comentario: "Estd bien, pero realmen de Arbitros Arbitradores" para deci- nancias. Esta sociedad la conocemos te inos beneficia a nosotros?" En el dir sobre los problemas que surjan muy bien los venezolanos y sabemos fondo de esta pregunta hay una le- entre la Orinoco-Iron y el Estado du en cudntos sufrimientos se traduce pa gitima desconfianza. rante las discusiones, teniendo acceso ra las grandes mayorias populares." Y los socialistas le respondemos a a los libros de cuentas de esas com este activista, a todos los trabajado panias; b) Que esa misma delegacibn Si a esta resolucibn del MAS, le res, a los estudiantes y al pueblo, obrera elabore un plan destinado a anadimos que el gobierno es el en- de una manera muy senciUa: solucionar alguna de las calamidades cargado de administrar esos "intere- que sufre nuestro pueblo, bashndose ses privados" (ipequeao olvido!), el Primero, los socialistas apoyamos en los 1,150 millones de bolivares MAS se queda a un paso de trans- la nacionalizacibn de la industria del que ingresarhn en 1975 por concepto formar su quejido en una politica cla hierro. Es una medida de autodefensa de hierro. sista, socialista y revolucionaria. nacional (mezquina, negociada a es- De esta manera, estariamos en con- Ese paso consiste en darse una ti paldas de los trabajadores, y tram- diciones de hablar, sin mentir, acerca nea de independencia del movimien posa, es decir, realizada por un go de que "el hierro es nuestro", y no to obrero con respecto a la tibia po bierno burgu^s como el de Carlos An- de los patronos. □ litica "nacionalista" de Carlos Andrds dr6s P^rez) pero que golpea a nuestro Pdrez y de todos los patronos de este enemigo principal, a los mismos que 3. Confederacibn General de Traba pais. invadieron Vietnam y Santo Domin jadores de Venezuela.

Intercontinental Press Discurso de Trofsky en el Funeral de Adolf Joffe

[El exilio de Maria Joffe de la Unidn que una revolucidn que no destruya biente — una ruptura que va basta la Sovi^tica, a principios de enero, ha al capitalismo, seria una caricatura misma mbdula de sus buesos — que vuelto a atraer la atencidn sobre la de revolucidn. a partir de alii, no bay peligro de que generacidn heroica de la Oposicidn [El siguiente episodio lo escribid alguna vez sean ganados por las de Izquierda, de la que ella es sobre- otro sobreviviente de la Oposicidn de ideas pequeflo burguesas. Adolf Abra viviente. La prensa ha recordado, en Izquierda. El autor andnimo de "Me movicb fue, y siguid siendo un re particular, a su esposo, Adolf Abra- morias de un Bolcbevique-Leninis- volucionario basta el fin. movich Joffe, importante diplomdtico ta" —que menciona con respeto a Ma sovidtico en los primeros aflos del ria Joffe en su obra — nos da ante- Los oradores boy aqui, se ban re gobierno revolucionario y uno de los cedentes que nos ayudan a entender ferid o, correctamente, al alto nivel de mds prominentes opositores a Stalin el texto que presentamos. sus conocimientos culturales. Como desde la izquierda. [" . . . ha llegado la bora de nue- diplombtico se vio obligado a mover- [La nueva generacidn de disidentes vo de llamar a la juventud sovidtica se en los circulos enemigos, entre ad- en la Unidn Sovidtica, los circulos a la amistad basada en ideas mu- versarios astutos, agudos y veneno- que ban despertado al pensamiento tuas, en la lucba por bacer posible un sos. El conocia este mundo, sus cos- politico, ban mostrado cierto interns futuro mejor para toda la bumani- tumbres y sus bbbitos, y asumid las en A. A. Joffe, de la misma manera dad . . . (la amistad) reforzada por maneras de ese mundo con finura y en que lo ban mostrado bacia otros la idea de lucbar por una causa co- babilidad; pero para bl, era como po- revolucionarios que fueron victimas mun. nerse un uniforme requerido por su de Stalin. For ejemplo, Roy Medve- [" . . . (tal) era la amistad entre puesto de deber. Adolf Abramovicb dev, cita extensamente en Let History Trotsky y Joffe. Mantuvieron su amis nunca usd un uniforme en su alma. Judge (Que la Historia Juzgue), un tad a travds de la prisidn y el exilio, Se ba dicbo aqui y correctamente, samizdat en el que se relataba el fu sin que jambs dsta se mancillara. Y que desconocia la rutina o las acti- neral de Joffe, que se suicidd en 1927, cuando el peligro amenazd a Trotsky, tudes estereotipadas o cualquier cues- en protesta por la expulsidn de Joffe se suicidd en seflal de protesta. tidn por el estUo. Encaraba cada pro- Trotsky y Zinoviev del partido. Otro ["Este tipo de amistades siempre em- blema como un revolucionario. Tuvo dramdtico relato sobre ese funeral, piezan durante la juventud y se ba- en sus manos puestos de responsabUi- que fue la liltima manifestacidn piibli- cen en nombre de algo grande, subli dad, pero nunca fue un burdcrata. ca de la Oposicidn de Izquierda don- me y lleno de propdsitos. Ese tipo de El burocratismo le era extraflo. El de pudieron bablar sus dirigentes, es- amistad dan ganas de inclinar la ca- veia cada problema desde el punto td en las "Memorias de un Bolcbevi- beza en seftal de respeto. . . ."2 de vista de la clase obrera, que se ba que-Leninista", que se publicaron en [La traduccidn de los elogios de bia elevado de las profundidades sub- un samizdat despuds de la caida de Trotsky a Joffe, obtenida de la trans- terrbneas a las alturas del poder del Khrushchev,l cripcidn de sus propias palabara be- estado. Encaraba dada problema des [Debido a la renovada atencidn ba cba por el orador, fue becba por de el punto de vista del proletariado cia los Joffe, publicamos por prime- George Saunders. Aparecerb en una internacional y la revolucidn interna- ra vez en inglds el discurso que Ledn coleccidn de perfiles politicos becbos cional. Y esta era la fuente de su for- Trotsky pronuncid en el funeral de por Trotsky que serb publicada por taleza, una fortaleza a la que bl cons- Joffe. Es dificU encontrar un relato Pathfinder Press.] tantemente recurria para combatir su mds acertado de la vida de Joffe. Par- propia debilidad psiquica. La fuerza ticipe de sus ideas y colaborador de Camaradas, Adolf Abramovicb ba de su mente y su babilidad para ejer- Trotsky desde los dias del Pravda de pasado a ser parte de la historia de la cer su poder lo acompaflaron basta Viena, Joffe, mucbo antes del diecisie- Ultima dbcada, sobre todo como re- el bltimo momento, cuando la bala te, defendid conjuntamente con el fu presentante diplombtico del primer es- dejd la mancba oscura que podemos ture dirigente del Ejdrcito Rojo, la tado obrero de la historia. Se ba di- ver aqui, boy, en su sien derecba. tests de que la Revolucidn Rusa ten- cbo aqui — y en la prensa —que fue Camaradas, ustedes pueden decir dria que ser de cardcter proletario, un diplombtico destacado. Eso es co- que renuncid a la vida por su propia Una revolucidn socialista. Joffe nun- rrecto. Fue un diplombtico, es decir, eleccidn. Y la revolucidn no le pre- ca dejd de creer que el siglo veinte sirvid en el puesto para el que babia mite a uno renunciar por su propia seria la era de la revolucidn perma- sido designado por la revolucidn y el iniciativa. Pero no permitamos que nente, una era en la que el decadente gobierno obrero. Pero, fue un gran nadie pretenda juzgar a Adolf Abra sistema capitalista ya no puede ba- diplombtico porque era un revolucio movicb. Porque bl renuncid en un pun cer avanzar la causa de la civiliza- nario basta el final. to en que, segiin su pensamiento, no cidn en la mds minima medida, en Por su origen social, Adolf Abramo tenia nada para ofrecerle a la revolu ninguna parte del mundo; una era en vicb era el producto de un medio bur- cidn mbs que su muerte. Entonces, fir- gubs —mbs precisamente, de una rica memente y con coraje, asi como babia 1. Publicado en la colleccidn Samiz famUia burguesa. Pero como sabe- vivido su vida, la dejd. dat Voices of the Soviet Opposition, mos, ba babido casos en la historia, Los tiempos dificOes nunca lo ate- (Samizdat Voces de la Oposicidn So- en que los productos de este tipo, morizaron. Se mantuvo siempre igual, vidtica) editada por George Saunders. ban roto tan tajantemente con su am- equilibrado todavia, en octubre de (Nueva York. Monad Press. Distribui- 1917, cuando era miembro, y mbs da por Pathfinder Press, 1974). 2. Samizdat, pbginas 174-175. tarde jefe del Comitb MUitar Revolu- February 24, 1975 cionario de Petrogrado; igual en el los recursos de la revolucidn. Ayuda- luchar. Separ^monos de dl con el mis- campo de batalla fuera de la ciudad ba a los camaradas con una mano mo esplritu con el que vivid y luchd: mientras los proyectiles del cafldn de generosa, sin esperar que se lo pidie- tomd posicidn bajo las banderas de Yudenichi estallaban por todos lados; ran, como un hermano, como un ver- Marx y Lenin; y bajo esas banderas igual en la mesa diplomdtica de Brest- dadero amigo. murid. i Y te prometemos, Adolf Abra Litovsk, y luego en tantas capitales Aqui, en este ataud, traemos los res- movich, que llevaremos tu bandera de Europa y Asia. Las dificultades tos mortales de esta persona excep hasta el final! no lo ago tab an. Lo que lo impulsd cional, a cuyo lado era tan fdcil y [Gritos de "i Hurra!". Se canta "La a dejar la vida, fue la conciencia de tan placentero para nosotros vivir y Internacional".] □ que era imposible para €l veneer esas dificultades. Camaradas, d^jenme decir esto —y Presos Socialistas en Argentina es Una consideracidn que creo, corres- ponde totalmente a los dltimos pensa- Segdn noticias aparecidas en Avan- pertenece a la Universidad de Tucu- mientos y a su testamento — una de- zada Socialista, drgano del Partido mdn. Luisa Segura es una conocida cisidn tal, renunciar a la vida por pro- Socialista de los Trabajadores de Ar dirigente estudiantil de la Facvdtad de pia decisidn, tuvo la fuerza del coraje. gentina, en el niimero del 30 de di- Medicina de esa Universidad. No permitamos que nadie pretenda se- ciembre de 1974, son varios los miem- Avanzada Socialista denuncia esas guier el ejemplo de este viejo luchador bros de esa organizacidn que se en- detenciones y seftala: en su muerte. No. Sigdmoslo en su cuentran detenidos a disposicidn del "Victimas de la injusta represidn vida. Poder Ejecutivo. En la cdrcel de Villa que, con el pretexto de la guerrilla ha Aquellos de nosotros que 6ramos Devoto se encuentra Jorge Mera, cono- desatado el gobierno contra el acti- sus amigos intimos, quienes no s61o cido dirigente bancario, lider de la vismo obrero y estudiantil y la co- luchamos codo a codo, sino que he- huelga del Banco de la Nacidn, que rrientes democrdticas y de izquierda, mos vlvido con &, durante dfeadas, jaqued a la dictadura militar que pre- los compafleros presos estdn mds que nos vemos obligados ahora a arran- cedid al actual gobierno. Jorge Mera nunca junto a nosotros. Como nues carnos la vivida imagen de esta excep- fue detenido junto con otros miem- tros siete queridos muertos de este cional persona y este excepcional ami- bros del PST, en el allanamiento al aflo, son el simbolo de que el Partido go que permanece en nuestros cora- local central de ese partido, que siguid sique y seguird luchando pese a quien zones. Habia un brillo gentil y cons- a la implantacidn del Estado de Sitio, pese. tante en Adolf Abramovich que daba producida el 6 de noviembre. "Este fin de aflo, en todas las mesas calidez en su alrededor. Fue un punto En una cdrcel de la ciudad de Co- donde nos reunamos con el puflo en focal alrededor del cual otros se reu- rrientes estd Daniel Veiga, que fue alto diremos: iPresentes, compafleros nian—en los clrculos de emigrados, arrestado durante una serie de proce- socialistas presos! Redoblaremos es- en las colonias penales, y en la pri- dimientos realizados en esa ciudad. fuerzos para que la movilizacidn obre- sidh. Venia, como ya he dicho, de En Bahia Blanca sigue detenido Sil ra y popular rescate a ustedes y a to- una famUia pudiente, pero los medios vio Dragunsky; y en Tucumdn, Luisa dos los obreros, estudiantes y mUitan- a su disposicidn en sus aftos mds Segura, que fue arrestada cuando la tes politicos que sin causa justificada jdvenes no fueron precisamente su policia irrumpid en una reunidn reali- alguna pueblan las cdrceles del go propiedad personal. Pasaron a ser zada en la Quinta Agrondmica, que bierno 'del pueblo.'" □

"Regularly buy and read the periodical Intercontinental Press INTERCONTINENTAL PRESS! " P.O. Box 116 Village Station That's the handwritten advice from one New York, N. Y. 10014 of our supporters in Tokyo. Name.Name

Right on! Street We can only add that the easiest way to State Zip_ "regularly buy and read" is to subscribe. , , ^ ^ mr, r ^ ^ ' ( ) Enclosed is $7.50 for six months. ( ) Enclosed is $15 for one year. So fill out the blank and mail it in. The Workers League and the International Committee By Tim Wohlforth

[We are publishing beiow the first of become obvious to anyone who reads Under conditions where each day there four installments of a lengthy state Wohlforth's account of the facts. are sizable demonstrations in Boston of ment written by a leading member of [Although Intercontinental Press dis an openly racist nature, stirred up by the international tendency founded by agrees with many of Wohlforth's po fascist elements, when Black youth who Gerry Healy, the general secretary of litical positions, his testimony on re attend South Boston High School were terrorized only a few days before the anti- the London-based Workers Revolu cent developments in the Workers racism march, it is a political travesty of tionary Party (formeriy the Socialist League and the Revolutionary Work no small size to denounce any march in Labour League). In New York, as na ers Party deserves, in our opinion, to Boston, under any leadership, which tional secretary of the Workers be brought to the attention of the rad- brings Black and white youth and work League, Tim Wohlforth for ten years icai movement internationally. We ers together in a common stand against headed the group in the United States therefore decided to make it available this racist offensive. whose reason for existence was the in our columns as a document. This The demonstration, of course, was ini defense and promulgation of Healy's decision was reached, we must add, tiated by a Democrat, and politically dom views. without consuiting Wohlforth. inated by the Socialist Workers Party [Recently the name of Tim Wohi- which controlled its apparatus. The poli cies of this SWP-Democratic Party bloc 3 forth vanished from the pages of the [We have taken the liberty of cor are reactionary and offer no way forward Bulletin, the newspaper he launched recting obvious typographical errors for the mass of Black and white workers and developed into a twice-weekly. in the mimeographed document that in Boston or elsewhere. In this sense, His name likewise vanished from the he made public and that we have used the march was like virtually all the peace Workers Press, Healy's daily paper as our source. We have also added a marches which had preceded it and upon published in London, which featured few footnotes, for which Wohlforth of which it was very much modeled. No Wohlforth's contributions for ten course bears no responsibility. Ail the political support could be given to the years. Neither the Bulletin nor the subheadings appeared in the original. leadership of the march in any form what Workers Press has as yet offered a [Following the finai installment of soever. In fact, many of those present gave no such political support. They car word of explanation as to what hap the statement, we plan to publish an ried their own banners with their own pened to this top figure in their move article commenting on Wohlforth's slogans and even, in several cases, had ment. The reasons for the silence will revelations and conclusions.! their own sound truck. However, the Workers League in the past participated in one form or another Part I: The Present Situation in the Workers League in every single anti-war march and every The Workers League has taken a sharp The recent Boston March Against Rac- single anti-war conference. In cases when turn to the right over this faii period in isml was such a test for ail political ten it became necessary to draw the sharpest the direction of centrism. Ultra-left dem dencies. None failed it so completely as line of divergence with the political line agogy of the most hollow and absurd the Workers League. of the leadership of the march, we not kind is being used to cover a compietely The Workers League now finds itself only marched under our own banner and conservative position of withdrawai from in a position where it stands objectively discipline but had our own rally with our any struggie within the working ciass. with the anti-busing forces. How else could own speakers after the march. The only In this way, the work of a decade in any worker interpret the statement appear march we did not march in was the last building a revoiutionary movement in the ing in boldface in Fred Mazelis' article one where, for tactical reasons, we de United States and internationaliy is being in the December 13 Bulletin:^ "This is a cided upon a large-scale literature sale swiftly undone. march against the workers of Boston involving over 50 people which was very This rightward turn is the political ex which seeks to place the responsibility effective pression of the new leadership of the for racism on the working class itself." There was one occasion where an anti Workers League created through the un war conference was called in New York precedented intervention of Comrade 1. The "National March Against Racism" City addressed by various labor bureau Healy to overthrow the old leadership was held December 14, 1974. Besides the crats including CIA-connected Victor at the August 30 and 31 meetings of the march in Boston, rallies and demonstra Reuther and Democratic Senator VanCe Central Committee of the League. The In tions were staged in various other cities ternational Committee as a whole must in the United States. The best coverage 3. The charge that the Democratic and accept full responsibility for the centrist of these actions and the developments lead Socialist Workers parties formed a "bloc" policies of the Mazelis leadership, itself ing up to them was provided by The Mil is ridiculous on the face of it. For a dis the product of the intervention of the IC itant See in particular the issues from cussion of the positions of the various in the person of Comrade Heaiy. October 4 to December 27. — IP groupings on the Boston events, includ ing the Workers League, see "Should Fed A. Boston March Against Racism 2. The Bulletin is the "twlce-weekiy organ eral Troops Be Used in Boston?" by Jo of the Central Committee of the Workers seph Hansen in the November 25, 1974, Political organizations are tested by ac- League." It features extensive reprints of issue of Intercontinental Press, p. 1562. tual events within the workers movement. articles from the Workers Press. — IP — IP February 24, 1975 Hartke. We not only participated in that all this is meaningless if the question of complex than simply raising demands to conference but actually assisted the SWP how such policies are to be brought for the unions. At this point, when political marshalls in removing from the hall the ward into the workers movement is ig movement and demonstrations begin to Progressive Labor and Spartacist forces nored. To denounce any march against take place in the communities, the mid who sought to disrupt the conference when racism as a march against the working dle class becomes very much involved. Reuther and Hartke spoke. At the same class, whUe at the same time faUing to Democratic party politicians move in and time, we forcefully put forward our own organize any concrete action themselves massive movements of students can be resolution and fought for it bitterly dur is the mark of abstract propagandists come involved, while revisionist elements gone mad. ing the conference. dominate and flourish. But this cannot be If, as Mazelis demagogically notes in Participation in a demonstration or con helped. It is part of the political develop his article, "hundreds were mobUized in ference dominated by revisionist policies ment of the American working class. It their unions to demand that the Greater and with Democrats on the platform or Boston Labor CouncU take action to de cannot be sidestepped through concentra in the leadership of the march is not a fend students and workers against the tion on trade union work alone. It must matter of principle. What is a matter of racists," why weren't these hundreds mo be confronted. We must be part of such principle is to keep one's own banner bUized to intervene in the march fight movements and within them fight out the clear of compromise with the Democrats ing against the revisionist leadership? It issues around which a mass movement of and to fight under such circumstances for is not enough simply to issue demands American workers can be built, while at a working class perspective. that the trade unions must act and then sit the same time participating in every trade back and do nothing yourself. As Lenin union struggle. But it is not simply a negative mat noted in his bitter fight against the econ ter of what is forbidden. Revolutionary In the past, the Workers League has un omists in What Is To Be DonS: "Calls policies are always a matter of doing what derstood this. We have always insisted for action, not in the general, but in the must be done under a given set of cir that the struggle against revisionism was concrete sense of the term can only be cumstances. It is activity. In this sense, a real part of the political preparation made at the place of action; only those principles are not fixed entities which one of the American working class. We real who themselves go into action and do ized that the student movement could not does not violate like virginity. Rather, so immediately, can sound such calls." principles represent the continuous strug be ignored and that the working class To begin with, to state than an econom movement could only be built in a strug gle to develop the working class political ic crisis underlies racism in no way min gle against middle class radicalism with ly under a continuously changing objec imizes the importance of a struggle in such student movements. tive situation. against racism itself. One cannot — as the It is precisely the sharpness of the cap Revolutionary Union® seeks to do — ignore Does the new situation in the economic crisis mean that we no longer face these italist economic crisis which underlies the or step around the racism which the cap emergence of racism in Boston. The pres italists are stirring up. The working class tasks? Can we now safely ignore the re sure of inflation on the one hand and cannot be united without a head-on con visionists in practice, and the students, rising unemployment on the other beats frontation over the difficult problems in while devoting ourselves exclusively to down upon both Black and white work working class consiousness, one of which the unions? The Boston March proves ers in Boston as elsewhere. It particularly happens to he racism. After all, work quite the opposite. After several years of affects the youth and the youth are very ers in Boston not only work in factories; decay of any political movement on the much in the forefront of this struggle in they live in South Boston and in Roxbury college and high school campuses, this Boston on both sides. The fascists seek where they send their chUdren to school. march represents a new stirring among to reach the unemployed white youth whUe The political struggle of the working students who represented the majority the militant leadership among the Blacks class therefore is not and cannot be con group of the over 12,000 who partici is among the unemployed Black youth. fined to the trade unions alone, partic pated. The march also shows that the re A policy against racism must begin with ularly in America where no mass workers visionists cannot simply be ignored. They this — the economic crisis underlying rac party exists. Struggles within the trade maintain a certain strength among these ism—^^and must have answers to this cri unions, important as they are, that re youth and they utilize it in a most reac sis. This is the importance of policies main within the unions are syndicalist and tionary manner. The grip of revisionism which concretely deal with unemploy can go nowhere. A labor party wUl not cannot be removed from the student move ment— 30 for 40,4 nationalization—and simply and directiy emerge from out of ment from a distance, with a few articles inflation—escalator clauseS — seen at all caucus-type struggles within the unions. in the Bulletin. This must take place in times politically within the framework of When struggles break out—such as this practice. a struggle to construct a labor party one over the busing question—in the based on the trade unions. Within this working class communities, issues are Another critical point is involved in the framework, specific proposals for mas raised which are central to the political issues raised over the Boston March. For sive aid to education, trade union de development of the entire working class. some years, the Workers League has in It becomes critical to participate in these fense of the Black youth under attack, etc., sisted on the critical role of a working struggles, while at the same time build can be raised. class youth movement in the building of ing forces within the unions. This is the All this Mazelis states in his article on a mass revolutionary party in the US. purpose of demands directed toward the the Boston March. All this is correct. But We learned this lesson particularly from trade unions. the experiences of the Socialist Labour However, political development is more 4. The Trotskyist movement in the United League-Workers Revolutionary Party — States has long advocated a sliding scale in England. The experience of the WL of hours to fight unemployment. In this 6. The Revolutionary Union is one of the over the past few years has proven this instance, the proposal is to spread the American Maoist sects. For consideration position to be absolutely correct. The work by cutting down the workweek, of its position in the Boston events see heart of the growth and development of to thirty hours while maintaining forty "Should Federal Troops Be Used in Bos the League since 1971 has been the de hours pay. — IP ton?" Also "Maoists on wrong side of bar velopment of the Young Socialists. It was ricades in Boston" by Jon HUlson in the only because of the development of the 5. The measure now included in many October 25 Militant, "Maoists join segrega YS that the publication of the Bulletin union contracts to maintain the workers' tionists in Boston" by Dave Frankel in twice-weekly became possible. Only this standard of living by providing for auto the November 8 Militant, and "Which way created the conditions for the League to matic wage increases to offset price hikes will RU march on Dec. 14?" by Wendy change to meet the new objective situa in basic commodities. — IP Lyons in the December 6 Militant —ZP tion: a change which the Mazelis lead-

Intercontinental Press ership is now determined to reverse. the conservative and abstentionist char members together in the summer of 1974. The working class develops unevenly. acter of the ultra-left rhetoric of Mazelis. This group played a critical role in estab The older workers today are willing to Over the past year, the WL held a num lishing the Mazelis leadership. Comrade struggle within the trade unions where ber of marches in cities across the nation Jacques had his own resolution but its they have strength to do so. These strug and in Washington. These marches were central thrust was along the same lines gles are of the greatest importance and highly successful and an important part as Hall's. they have a major impact on the class of the life of the YS movement we had All these tendencies represented a centrist relations and the economic crisis itself. built. Now, for four months, the YS has retreat from the construction of a revolu But, at the same time, these older work not held a single march. Mazelis not only tionary youth movement. They covered ers are not yet ready to grasp revolution condemns the December 14 march but, their centrism by calling for a "turn to ary politics in any significant number or, despite branch work in the Roxbury area the unions." For these people, trade union as yet, to take any action in the unions for several years, he himself failed to work became a cover for the perpetuation for a labor party. They remain very much organize a single such march under the of a middle class circle of radicals distant as syndicalists in their thinking at this banners of theWL and YS. from any revolutionary perspectives. At point. However, the conditions are already The December 14 abstention is the cul heart, these forces represented an extreme being created for a swift change in this mination and expression of the policies ly conservative and liquidationist ten thinking at the next point of the struggle. of the Workers League over the past three dency. With the working class youth, the sit months. It is what Comrade Mazelis con They actually reflected a new form of uation is different. These youth have no ceives of as a "balanced approach" in the old economist tendency which Lenin future now. It is among these youth that which youth work is to be combined with fought in What Is To Be Done? Lenin, the forces who can grasp the question of some student work, and a lot of trade in that fight, insisted that the trade unions revolution immediately are to be found. It union work. Above all, one must never had to be placed within the framework of is not that these youth can make a revolu get too tired or certainly sell too many the all-sided character of the political tion now. But they can grasp revolution papers. Everything must be in perfect struggle of the working class. Trade union ary thinking. A revolutionary movement balance. consciousness is a form of bourgeois con must be built of revolutionary material. However, perfect balance is a state of sciousness and the revolutionary party These youth represent such material. This motionlessness. It is always important to can never be limited to it. It is necessary is why they must represent the heart of carry out party work in an all-sided way. to struggle continuously against this con a revolutionary party today. Only a party But such work must have a thrust, a cen sciousness as one works within the unions. based primarily among working class tral direction, yes, a one-sidedness to it. Of course this is not simply a negative youth can be revolutionary in this period At the heart of the work of the party this affair of criticizing the narrowness of the and as a revolutionary party fight out fall should have been the fight to continue trade union outlook. It requires that a all the problems of development within to develop and expand the Young Social revolutionary party — starting from rev the working class as a whole. ist branches, in the neighborhoods, at the olutionary perspectives — fight on all the high schools and on the campuses. This political issues that affect the lives of work The importance of the Boston March should have been combined with a battle ers. The struggles within the trade unions lies precisely in its youthful character in to build up the circulation of the press must thus be placed within this context. volving layers of high school youth for and on this basis buUding political sup the first time in these broader-type move port in the unions. The meaning of this is even more clear ments. At the same time, the great crime Instead, the League, particularly on the in light of the recent developments in Bos the WL committed in abstaining on De urging of Mike Banda,7 has become pre ton. A revolutionary party cannot be buUt cember 14 — and it was a crime—lies pre occupied with trade union work. But the by seeking to sidestep the issue of racism cisely in the fact that the League was the trade unions in America, while involved posed in Boston. It cannot simply plough best prepared to mobilize youth forces in critically important struggles have not ahead with this or that proposal for trade to participate. In this way, these youth yet become political. Thus, the trade union union policy. This will be as effective in could have been politically educated in work was not really "work." It involved Boston and other American cities as it the concrete struggle against revisionism. little more than reportage in the press would in Northern Ireland. One can have At the same time, this activity, together and hollow denunciations of the labor a policy for trade union action in the with what should have been continuing bureaucrats. In the meantime, the life of shipyards of Belfast but if one has no activity on the part of the WL branch the branches became all the more the life policy on the question of the unification in the area is of great importance in and of little circles of middle class people hang of Ireland which is fought out openly of itself in fighting racism. The trade ing around the unions just as the old IS among Protestant workers then one has unions will never organize the youth in group used to do before its breakup. no revolutionary policy at all. the neighborhoods. Only revolutionists Racism is not an accidental feature of can do that. But the organization of the the United States. It is rooted in its 300 B. The Trade Unions and Centrism youth in the neighborhoods around a year history, as we have explained in our working class program is central to fight At the 1973 Workers League conferencci book. The History Of The American ing the development of fascist forces a tendency was present which openly re Working Class. There is no way forward among these youth. At this stage, work flected the resistance of entire layers of to the American Revolution without fight among Black youth is most critical. How ing, in the new context of the modern cap the League to the transformation of the ever, important changes are already de italist crisis, the question posed in the old League into an actual workers move veloping among white working class great American Civil War. To view the ment. This tendency was composed of youth because of the tremendous rise in events in Boston as some sort of aber three elements. First was Irving Hall who unemployment among these youth. The ration to be played down rather than as submitted an oppositional resolution. Sec fascists see this and seek to win support a central feature of the struggle we must ond was Steve Seltzer who supported Hall. among this strata. We can and must be wage against bourgeois thinking in the Third was Comrade Jacques Gagnon, a gin to penetrate these layers as well as working class is an economist error of the man who would later be instrumental in layers of Black youth. This is the role of bringing a grouping of former party worst sort. Its conclusions are completely a mass Young Socialists. Marching on centrist in practice. December 14 could have contributed to Only to the extent that an all-sided fight building such a YS throughout Boston. 7. One of Gerry Healy's chief lieutenants. around all the political issues confront It is this which above all makes clear -IP ing the working class is honestly waged February 24, 1975 can a revolutionary cadre be assembled. jority. Comrade Gerry Healy supported American working class it is not pos Only on this basis can more and more this position down the line speaking from sible to buUd significant party branches trade unionists become part of that rev the floor of the conference on it himself. in the small towns of the rural mining olutionary cadre. To see the struggle as The Workers League of today has gone areas. An intervention in the miners union a matter primarily of the construction over completely to the positions of Hall- then is primarily for the understanding of trade union caucuses is to liquidate the Seltzer-Gagnon. The group of comrades and training of workers elsewhere, for party itself, subordinating it to a form of who recently rejoined the movement were the construction of branches in cities like organization within the limits of bour all associated with that general outlook Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Youngstown. geois consciousness. This is why the cau when they were formerly in the party. At the same time, this background in cus building school of "revolutionary" pol They were organized by Gagnon, a lead no way lessens the militancy of the min itics is always accompanied by a decay ing proponent of that position in 1973. ers. Quite the opposite. The existence of in the building of the party. The result has been a paper more and whole towns made up almost entirely of When perspectives are posed in this way, more divorced from theory, limited to miners isolated from the rest of the coun the question of why a cadre recruited abstract propaganda about this or that try has contributed to their solidarity. It, from the working class youth is so critical trade union struggle, a youth movement however, has also contributed to syndical becomes even clearer. Only with such a in decay, a declining circulation of the ist traditions among miners — a tremen cadre can we begin to transform trade press and finally the abstentionist line dous union consciousness on the one hand unionists as well as middle class students toward the Boston March. The record and a fantastic political and cultural back and intellectuals into party people. is clear. Comrade Gerry Healy has en wardness on the other. This is the general approach we took gineered a complete reversal in the politi What is necessary in order to develop to this question during the summer of cal positions of the League. He has a strategy of intervention in the recent 1973, at the 1973 conference, and in the backed a centrist overthrow of revolu miners strike is to understand this strike year which followed. Comrade Healy par tionary perspectives fought for over a in its historical perspective. At no point ticipated in these discussions insisting par decade. in the recent coverage of the strike by the ticularly on the importance of classes for Bulletinwas this done. workers. "He insisted that we first fight The present Miller leadership is the for such classes and not simply for cau C. Lessons of the Miners Strike product of a highly contradictory devel cuses based on trade union policies alone. opment in the trade unions, a develop The centrist character of the Mazelis ment by no means exclusive to the min leadership is expressed sharply in the ers, but for the reasons stated ahove, takes Therefore, it was no accident that in Workers League's recent intervention in on a sharp expression among the miners. the summer of 1973, when we launched an the miners strike.® The coverage of the Miller led a massive movement of rank all-out struggle among the older party miners strike has been characterized by and file miners against the corrupt Boyle cadre to drive the party into the work an abstract ultra-leftism which has func leadership. Miller did this in an oppor ing class, that our sharpest conflict came tioned as a very thin cover for a purely tunist way leaning dangerously upon the over the old forms of our trade union syndicalist perspective. The latter has led, federal government in his campaign work. This was most true with our caucus as it always does, to opportunism in against Boyle. He encouraged govern in the Social Service Employees Union. practice. ment intervention in the life of the UMW^ The work within the SSEU was begun by First, it must be understood that trade and in that way weakened the union Comrade Sebastian as early as 1965. union perspectives do not begin in the movement. But at the same time, this Comrades Dennis O'Casey and Lucy St. trade unions. They are an expression of movement was more than Miller and the John were recruited out of that work. party perspectives. Under conditions in bourgeois government. It was an elemen At various times, that work received wide which a party has no real perspective, tal movement of masses of workers such support within the SSEU, where the cau then trade union work can only be trade as will take place in the next period in cus almost gained a majority for various union work. As such it remains within a number of unions. proposals. the limits of bourgeois consciousness and Miller sought to limit his struggle to However, the SSEU work had never is in no sense revolutionary. This is why the question of "democracy" in the unions. been real party building work. Few came it is critical to understand the recent min The ranks viewed things differently. For out of the SSEU into the movement. Those ers struggles as part of the struggle to them democracy was necessary to gain who did join were middle class radicals construct the party, to train Marxist control of the union in order to utilize who happened to be members of the cadres and not as a thing-in-itself to in the union as a weapon of struggle against SSEU. The SSEU caucus was particu tervene in. the employer. So, while Miller did his larly distant from the working class mi The very nature of mining in the United best to avoid the real issues facing the nority workers who, by 1973, made up States places a great limit upon our abil union, these issues were raised soon after the bulk of the SSEU members. It is not ity to intervene in a party way. The mines Miller came to power and have been at the accidental that in the course of the year are located in a culturally backward part center of the recent strike. which followed, the entire SSEU caucus of the country distant from any cities. The Workers League correctly gave crit one by one left the movement, collapsing At this stage in the development of the ical support to Miller against Boyle. We before the tasks of building a youth move based this support on Trotsky's under ment and of reaching the workers in the standing of the importance of support SSEU. This included Alex Steiner, Den 8. The miners' strike began November ing any group within the union which will nis O'Casey, Ronnie R., Karen Frahicel, 12 and lasted until December 5. For on- loosen the hold of the bureaucracy upon Neal F., and others. the-scene reports from the coal fields in the ranks, which will open up the situation The 1973 conference counterposed the West Virginia, Illinois, and Colorado, see for our own development in the unions. revolutionary perspectives, which had the articles by Cindy Jaquith, Ed Heis- At the same time, it was necessary to been hammered out over the preceding ler, Pat Hayes, and Jack Marsh in The place Miller in power in order to create year and were incorporated in the "Per Militant from November 15 to December conditions for the breaking of Miller's spectives For The American Revolution" 13. Also see the articles by Frank Lovell own supporters from Miller. document, against this economist and cen analyzing the meaning of the strike pub This position of the Workers League trist position of Hall, Seltzer and Gagnon. lished in the November 15, December 13, In the end, these three comrades withdrew and December 20 issues of The Militant their documents and voted with the ma -IP 9. United Mine Workers. —IP Intercontinental Press is never mentioned by David North in tradictory development of the Miller group ers strike had to be subordinated to the his extensive writings on the miners strike. over the past few years. It was neces general party tasks of this period. These, In any event it is impossible to inter sary to expose its relations with the gov as we have stated, must center on the con vene in the present situation in the miners ernment and thus, its inability to offer a struction of a youth movement and, with union unless one has a proper under real alternative to the Boyle forces. this movement, building the party press standing and policy towards the past of Within this framework, a section of and party branches in the central indus the union which created the present. The workers could be fought for who began trial cities of the country. While North question could not be clearer. The tre to grasp the need for a Marxist force was running around the mining areas, the mendous opportunities which existed dur in the unions, training themselves as part branches in the relatively nearby areas of ing this past period for rank and file of the revolutionary party and fighting Youngstown and Cleveland were allowed struggle against the Miller leadership were for a labor party in their union. The to decay. No attempt was made to re possible only because the Miller group orientation should have been toward the build in Pittsburgh where we made a good defeated the old Boyle machine. Thus his forces around Miller. A ruthless exposure beginning on a branch last year but were tory has proven us completely correct should have been conducted against all unable to maintain that work. Coverage in our support to Miller over Boyle. The the remnants of the old Boyle machine of the mines became a cover for the ac tremendous outbreak of opposition to Mil who sought to hide behind opposition to tual liquidation of the party, a cover for ler and his contract proves the correct the contract. It was not simply a matter the lack of struggle within the party and ness of the critical character of the sup of defeating the contract but of educat by the party over anything. It was a port we gave Miller against Boyle. We ing even a small layer of workers in the journalistic snowjob to cover up for a supported Miller only to create the con course of the struggle against the con party running away from its historic ditions to fight him. Anyone who does tract. tasks. not understand such a position does not This important intervention in the min [Next week: Disintegration of the Youth] understand dialectics. The difficulty with the position of North and the Mazelis leadership is that, since they do not begin from this perspective, they open themselves up to an opportun Turkish Workers Fight for Right ist relationship with precisely the remnants of the old Boyle regime which still have to Choose Their Own Unions considerable strength in the union. What North does is simply denounce Miller in [The Turkiye Sosyalist Isci Partisi the Middle East. The translation from the as extreme terms as he can. Then he dis (TSIP—Socialist Workers party of Tur Turkish is by Intercontinental Press.] cusses the need for the labor party in key) was legally constituted on June 22, a most abstract manner. When it comes 1974. It was the first left party to or to concrete policies he supports without ganize legally since the banning of the criticism any and all forces within the Workers party of Turkey in 1941 and The year 1974 is now behind us. As union who oppose the contract. He even the first to try to take advantage of the we go into the new year, the balance defends these forces from the criticisms restoration of bourgeois democracy after of the revisionists. His concrete policy sheet of the old is marked by the strug three years of mOitary rule. gle fought by the Turkish workers for within the UMW gets no further than a [Like its predecessor, the Workers party, no vote on the contract. the right to choose their own unions. the TSIP is a left-centrist formation. But It is not simply a matter of the rank There is no doubt that the struggle of it seems to have drawn around it some and file miner who opposes the contract. our working class is undergoing a new elements with revolutionary aspirations. North was able to get close to members upsurge. In the aftermath of three years of the negotiating committee—largely It has also tried to draw some lessons of open fascism, spontaneous mobiliza union officials—who opposed the con from the experience of the Turkish left tions have been developing one after the tract. In this fashion—very much like before the 1971 coup. For example, the other. At the same time, by the battles his interviews in 1972 with Abel—North recent issues of its weekly paper Kitle they have waged in the shops, the most is giving a form of very uncritical sup (Mass) have carried a series of articles conscious sections of our working class port to the old Boyle regime in the union. criticizing a Maoist wing of the Workers have lanced a sore that was becoming Talk of a labor party is only a cover party for its concept of a "national dem gangrenous [i.e., the situation created by for such crass opportunism in practica ocratic revolution" and for sacrificing collaborationist trade unions]. It is precisely the political backward working-class political independence for For many years the authorities con ness of America — most extremely ex a petty-bourgeois nationalist and reform cealed the fact that the workers had a pressed in the culturally backward min ist perspective. right to choose their own unions. But ing districts where men also strike against for the whole last year our working class "ungodly" books in the schools — which has been demanding this right with ex makes it so easy for demagogic forces [In recent years, the industrial work traordinary determination. to maneuver within the unions disguis ing class in Turkey has grown consid ing themselves as militants. Union policy erably, and the activity of the left since In the struggle that began in Isdemir on April 15-16, the workers shouted:"We alone is insufficient to flush them out. the restoration of parliamentary rule What was needed was to assess the con- seems to be concentrated largely on the will choose our own unions, we will put problem of building representative unions. an end to company unions." Rising from In the following editorial, published De the south, this powerful voice swelled and Intercontinental Press will cember 31, 1974, ifftZe reviews the devel echoed, despite terror, pressure, harass opment of the union movement in 1974 ment, and unjust persecution. give you a week by weekanaly- from its point of view. Regardless of the At Ulker, Ins a, and Epengle, the work sis of the most important world correctness or incorrectness of some politi ers took up this slogan; and the bour events. cal views expressed, this editorial offers a geoisie retreated. Only yesterday they certain indication of the problems in the avoided even using the word "referendum." Subscribe now! growth of industrial unionism in the most But now they have been forced to recog powerful and most developed country in nize it as a right. A provision on referen- February 24, 1975 dums was included in the legislative pack ognized "de facto." The referendum strug sure of a violent awakening among the age of twenty laws proposed to parlia gle confirmed the principle that every kind ranks has put the leading cadres of the ment by Turk Is. 1 However, it was only of struggle by the workers must be direct Social Democratic unions in a position recently that this same Turk Is started ed by a working-class political organiza where they cannot pursue such a policy. resorting to all sorts of underhanded tion. In 1975, no matter what political This has forced these cadres to clarify wheeling and dealing and Byzantine in force comes to power, the right of ref what they want and to carry it out in trigues in order to block the referendum erendum must be written into the law. practice. law. This means that the success won in the One of the best examples of this process By dint of persistence, our working ciass struggle for the right to choose your own was the case of the municipal workers' won confirmation of certain rights with trade union must be made "official." In strikes in Ankara, Istanbul, and Izmir. the Labor Law and the Trade Unions any case, we have to declare triumphant These actions were begun with the usual Law. In Cukurova, although it later ly that the referendum struggle has been political considerations. But after a short changed its mind the Labor Court agreed won in fact. And the Turkiye Sosyalist time the workers adopted a militant course to a referendum to solve a jurisdictional Isci Partisi is proud of this. This right, that went beyond the limits of the lines dispute involving tens of thousands of for which working-class activists have laid out by the leading cadres and de textile workers. The dispute between Cag- struggled bitterly for decades, has become veloped into a model of economic class das Metal Is and Turk Is in the MKE the property of our working class as a struggle. works also had to be decided by a ref whole. In assessing the past year as a whole, erendum. In making a general evaluation of the there is a third point that must be made. To sum it up, let us say that the right workers struggles in 1974, we note anoth With gradually increasing speed, the of referendum resisted by the bourgeoisie er encouraging development. The union trade-union leaderships have been pass has become a reality through this legis federation that includes the most con ing into the hands of revolutionary lation. The most important thing, more scious and militant elements of our work cadres. Revolutionary cadres have been over, is that from the biggest factories ing class and remains the hope of the gaining influence in the union leaderships to the workbenches of the smallest artisan broad working masses, the DISK,3 in at the same time as counterrevolutionary shops, the workers have claimed this right creased its strength last year. At the same elements have been cleared out. and consciously understood it. time, Turk Is steadily declined. This development has given notice that So, the referendum campaign that the DISK went into 1974 with thirteen mem the so-calied generation of 1947 that has Turkiye Sosyalist Isci Partisi initiated ber unions. During the year it found that set its stamp on the Turkish trade-union "with the correct timing" started in the many unions wished to join. Some broke movement for twenty-five years is pass context of this "de facto situation," despite from the ranks of Turk Is. Others were ing from the stage. Following an Ameri the bloody assaults of the ruling class and reacting rightly against the Turk Is can-type conception of trade unionism, the unpardonable indifference of some of unions. Others were organizations that they were convinced that they had a mis the trade-union and democratic organiza had striven for years to remain indepen sion to make sure that our working class tions. With the help of a poster campaign dent. In these cases, it was not because never attained class consciousness. The in the big cities, various assemblies were of the preferences of the leaders that the job performed by this generation was to organized in the industrial areas. decision was taken to join DISK, but be trap the trade-union movement within the One of the posters prepared for the cause of the demands and insistence of narrow limits of economism and apolitical TSIP's campaign summed up the struggie the ranks. syndicalism. in the clearest way:"We will take the right The unions that officially joined were Now that they are losing their posi of referendum literally!" In fact, if the Plas Is [Special Workers], Ozgur Haber tions in the trade-union leaderships, these right of referendum has taken on incom- Is [Free Journalists], Tek-Sen [Textile elements are losing their influence. While parabiy more reality than other rights, Workers], the Devrimci Toprak Iscileri in earlier years they had been ieaving this is not because of any favor from [Revolutionary Agricultural Workers], these positions of their own accord, now the ruling class, or the fulfillment of a Bay Sen Is [Vendors], and Sosyal Is they are beginning to be forced out by promise by the Social Democratic CHP,2 [Social Workers]. Petkim, Petro Kimya the pressure of a revolutionary wave ris nor because of a pure trade-union strug Is [Petrochemical Workers], and TekstU ing from the ranks. This is important not gle. In fact, this was achieved by an or completed the necessary contacts. In the only because the counterrevolutionary ele coming months the general assemblies of ganizing campaign carried out with the ments are being cleaned out but because correct tactics and oriented by the political these unions are to meet, and will make of the inclinations of the new generations' organization of the working class. A need the official decision to join. going in. for this kind of organization had emerged In contrast to this encouraging devel The young revolutionary cadres who within the working class and been reflect opment in DISK, the conflict between the are replacing a generation that failed com various wings of Turk Is has sharpened, ed for some time by spontaneous mo pletely to understand the essential unity with splits occurring in some places. In bilizations. of economic and political struggle and particular, this federation's ties with the From this standpoint, the success that did not even have an especially clear Social Democratic unions Tune, Side, and achieved by the struggle did not consist understanding of their role have been the Ozdemir, which had been becoming solely of getting a democratic right rec- most conscious element in the process of frayed, seem to have broken entirely. In organizing our working class and as this process, the driving force has been sembling it in the ranks of its own party. 1. Turkiye Isci Sendikarlari Konfederas- the reaction among the ranks of the So In 1974, hundreds of strikes and labor yonu—Turkish Trade Union Confedera cial Democratic unions to the fact that struggles of every magnitude have mobi tion, the national federation affiliated to the reactionary clique that runs Turk Is lized the working class in action and given the International Confederation of Free has gone openly under the control of rise to new experiments, expertise, and ex Trade Unions. the big capitalists. Evidently, the pres- perience. However, if we have to single out a few of these, the following emerge as 2. Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi—Republican 3. Devrimci Iscileri Sendikasi Konfederas- the year's most important events in the People's party, the party of former Pre yonu — Revolutionary Workers Trade workers movement: the struggles at Epen- mier Bulent Ecevit. Union Confederation. gle. Ins a, and Ulker, the strike at Gisla-

Intercontinental Press ved, the staggered strikes in the Aliaga and Ipras refineries, the municipal work Protest by Draftees From the Antilles ers' strikes in the three large cities, the struggle at Isdeihir, the PTT,4 and the [The following is the text of a state being made to do the dirty work like jurisdictional dispute that involved tens ment circulated by soldiers from the An this poor little ? Tough." We find our of thousands of textile workers at tilles stationed at Draguignan, France. selves at this level: barracks boys; the gar Cukurova. The transiation is by Intercontinental bage cans must be cleaned by Blacks; The struggles of the workers at Insa, Press. ] etc. Ulker, and Epengle proved to be the most We are very bitter about this treatment. effective propaganda for the "referendum We are in no way stupid or lacking in campaign." While the spark struck by the intelligence. There is no reason to believe Ulker workers touched off a potential for We come for the most part from our that there are no other things we can do action that had been accumulating for islands, known more familiarly as the on this base (Are all the other soldiers years, the Insa and Epengle workers "Antilles." Some of us already live fi:om the Antilles on other French bases wiped out the last resistance by the bour in France, owing to the fact that a law treated the same way?) geoisie to the referendum and to the right passed by the French government in 1946 Is the truth summed up in that little of workers to choose their own unions. made us a departement. This meant that phrase "to work like Blacks," a phrase The strike begun by the 900 workers a great number of us have been called that is pardonable on the lips of some? at the Gislaved factory, which is still con into uniform to carry out, like all French Won't this ever change? In addition, the tinuing, is another demonstration that men, our twelve months of military ser attitude of the noncommissioned officers, our working class has won the freedom vice in France proper. who are supposed to teach us about lib erty, equaiity, and fraternity, encourages to choose its unions. The Gislaved work We have been called up, and since the similar skepticism among certain draftees. ers had been forced by various legal de beginning we have been set apart and re (This is true not only for us but also for vices to be members of the Kaucuk Is marked upon because of our color, which those who are of North African origin, Sendika [Rubber Workers Union]. But is somewhat dark and leads to our fre and for other "foreigners.") the real unions belonging to the Lastik quently being called "colored people," and because of the stiff texture of our hair Is [Rubber Workers] gained jurisdiction We are not in some penitentiary where (we are sincerely very proud of all these in some divisions and started a strike. systematic harassment is to be practiced features, and the same is true of the other The mass of workers joined in with model against people from the Antilles. We are races). discipline and steadfastness, braving the and would like to remain no more and First of all there were two months of brutal sun of the hottest summer months no less than soldiers fulfilling their na classes. There we discovered men who and making the Gislaved strike another tional duty. We do not wish to hear any are called "career soldiers," who sought thing more, like the statement by that bastion of our referendum struggle. by all means to convince us to become captain, about our not being Frenchmen. real men (does this mean that a man The decision of the municipal workers Our fathers and grandfathers were among who has not completed his military ser in Ankara, Izmir, and Istanbul to go on the first to fight in defense of France in vice is not a reai man?). We would have strike, and the actual implementation of the first and second world wars. been happy to believe them, but little by this in Ankara and Izmir helped on the We would like to believe that everything littlei as the days passed, we came to one hand to discredit the labor policy possible will be done to clear up these realize that under the system we were misunderstandings. of the CHP, and on the other, showed being subjected to we would be more likely how far the Social Democratic trade Soldiers from the Antilles to leave as mental cases. Nineteenth Artillery Regiment unionists had been left behind by devel After "school" was over each of us, Draguignan opments. colored people and the others, were sent These are the events that we consider The signers of this statement collectively into a branch (in the quartermaster supply support the Appeal of the One Hundred.D most important for the workers move units). But one little thing couid hardly he ment in 1974. But both from the stand overlooked, even by the naked eye: most point of the number of workers involved of the soldiers from the Antilles ended up Expelled Socialists Win Reinstatement and what was at stake, the outstanding with a broomstick in hand. Why? to Australian Young Labor Association labor action in 1974 was the struggle There was a time when our ancestors at Isdemir. The fight that the 15,000 were slaves at the mercy of those who The thirty-one socialists who were ex workers who work in the Iskenderun De- exploited them. We won't draw any pic pelled from the Victorian Young Labor mir Celik building sites put up against tures, because you are certain to be well Association (YLA) in February 1974 the bosses who have established a monop aware of the facts (thanks to Victor without notice or a hearing have won oly in the building sector and the fight Schoelcher). In any event, all that was their fight for reinstatement. They were against the fierce terror that swept the abolished and now that we people from readmitted by a special YLA conference Iskenderun-Payas region in the days fol the Antilles find ourselves in French bar on December 14, after a broad campaign lowing this struggle had an impact on our racks, we don't want to turn around and to mobilize rank-and-fUe support in the put up with the same nonsense our great YLA and the Australian Labor party entire working class. This demonstrated grandfathers did, even under duress. forced the ALP to intervene and recom the value of some clear lessons. The most Statements we all know about have often mend reversal of the expulsions. important of all these lessons, however, been made by both low- and higher- The conference adopted a new consti is that without the guidance of a poiitical ranking officers. An example: There is tution that provides some safeguards for organization, no matter how strongly one of us who is usually stationed at the membership rights. For example, it pro fought a struggle is, it will come to gunsight, and we have learned that a vides for an open-conference structure; al nothing. □ superior officer came out with thefollowing lowing all YLA members to attend and remark: "I don't want anyone like 'that' express their views, rather than a dele inside ther^ I don't have any confidence gated system as advocated by the right 4. Posta, Telegraf, Telefon Idaresi—Post in him." And again, by the same officer, wing. However, the new constitution still al, Telegraph, and Telephone Adminis addressing a second-class soldier like us fails to formalize the right to form po tration. who made a complaint "You don't like litical tendencies. February 24, 1975 length in the press. In reality, we have The Appeal of the One Hundred been transformed into social ciphers, into political less-than-nothings. Undoubtedly [The following is the text of the Appeal Is it a revelation to say that the time this is so that we can be better used of the One Hundred being circulated in spent in military service is too often a against workers, so that we can be the French army. The translation is by period in which we are forced to undergo compelled to break strikes should the need Intercontinental Press.] harassment that is aimed solely at break- arise. ing our wUl, at making us docile followers We demand complete freedom of infor of orders? In fact, military regulations mation and political expression on mili permit any officer to give the most out tary hases and the right to choose between One day we received an order calling landish orders and then to mete out pun military and civilian dress when we are us up for national service. Under the law, ishment whenever he wishes to any sub not on duty, whatever our activities. we were compelled to report at a certain ordinate for "refusing to obey." In general, Is it astonishing that the youth refuses specified date. At the time we had to don off-base housing and leaves are used as to approve of a system in which appren uniforms, however, a number of us had a permanent form of blackmail to assure ticeship is based solely on passive obedi not been able to resolve our personal our docility and servility. ence and blind discipline? A system in affairs, some of which were of major con We demand an end to all forms of ha which the training despite cabinet minis cern; professional training, personal life, rassment, and the granting of weekly ter Galley's denials, can claim a 7 percent financial independence or stability, ob leaves. dropout rate? How can we tolerate a sys taining a job, and so forth. Thus, since It is said that the army's main function tem in which draftees have no legal rights, the problems of starting out in life are is national defense. Consequently, we do in which we can be imprisoned for two extremely acute, for some of us the depar not understand why some of us have months with no redress, with no contact ture for military service amounted to a been sent to the German Federal Repub with the outside world, often under genuine catastrophe. lic, since relations with this country have deplorable conditions of detention? How We are located, for the most part, hun long been of a peaceful nature, and noth can we tolerate the fact that military se dreds of kilometers from the places where ing has occurred that would seem to call curity has the right to investigate our we work, or where our family and friends them into question. maU, our personal affairs, that it can live, without being able to do much about We demand an end to being stationed carry out surveillance of our comings it. For a period of a year, whatever social beyond French borders. and goings and keep a watch over our and personal relationships we have are contacts? The army is a veritable state conditioned by where we happen by As soldiers, we can vote. But oddly chance to be stationed, by the whims of enough, we do not have the right to keep within a state over which civilians cannot military training. ourselves informed as we see fit. We do exercise any authority. The recent events in Chile show where this can lead. And This is why we demand the right to not have access to the newspapers of our we refuse to put up with it. choose the date and place of service, choice on military bases. We are even between the ages of eighteen and twenty- punished if we bring certain newspapers We demand the dissolution of the mili tary security bureau, the abolition of mili five. onto the base. Political discussions and tary courts and all military sanctions, as We feel that our pay is ridiculously activities are forbidden. We note that this well as the prisons, special camps, and low. It does not enable us to take care prohibition does not extend to military other camps the army has set up to im of the expenses, even modest ones, spokesmen sharing the government's prison those it finds guilty. required by our travel and leisure activ point of view, who express themselves at □ ities. It does not permit us, if we have a companion, or children, to contribute toward their living expenses. What we need, in contrast, is a supplementary al In Defense of the Droguignon Defendants lowance. We therefore demand pay equal to the minimum wage and the right to [ The following is the text of a joint leaf and the right to weekly leaves. travel without charge let circulated in defense of the French sol • An end to being stationed beyond We have all been able to see that many diers victimized after the September 10, French borders. volunteers who entered the army when 1974, demonstration in Draguignan. The • Complete freedom of information and they were very young would like to return translation is by Intercontinental Press.] political expression on military bases and to civilian life. They are prevented from the right to choose between civilian and doing so by the papers they signed after military dress when we are not on duty, letting themselves be taken in by the lies The undersigned organizations, meeting whatever our activities. of military propaganda; or because they September 11, 1974, affirm their solidar • The dissolution of the military secu reluctantly reenlisted, having received no ity with the draftees of the Nineteenth Ar rity bureau, the abolition of military professional training enabling them to re- tillery Regiment of Draguignan who dem courts and all military sanctions, as well enter civilian life. onstrated on September 10. They also af as the prisons, special camps, and other We think that enlistees should be able firm their support for the demands put camps the army has set up to imprison to cancel their term of service at any forward in the Appeal of the One Hun those it finds guilty. time. dred: These organizations declare their readi Our isolation for a year, and the result • The right to choose the date and ness to mobilize in defense of the draftees ing sexual and emotional misery, is place of service, between the ages of eigh against any sanctions that may be taken heightened by the requirement to spend teen and twenty-five. against them by military authorities. nights on the base and to be present at • Pay equal to the minimum wage, and roll calls. Is this hazing, for that is in the right to travel without charge. French Democratic Confederation of effect what it amounts to, indispensable • The possibility for enlistees to can Labor, Antimilitarist Committee, Labor to our military training? We think not. cel their contract at any time. Force, Communist Organization Revolu We must have the right to do whatever • The right to do whatever we wish tion! Socialist party. Revolutionary Com we want outside fixed hours of military outside fixed hours of military duty, from munist Front, French Communist party. duty. And from the first day of our en the first day in the army. United Socialist party. Free Thought, listment too. • The abolition of hazing in any form. Atom Information Committee.

Intercontinental Press Brazilian Censors' 'List of Forbidden Topics'

[Brazil's leading daily, O Estado de 6. Activities related to terrorism and about the actions taken by the military Sao Paulo, appeared January 4 without subversion, mainly when they mention the or civil police intended to discredit these direct censorship for the first time in more execution of security agents. police organizations. than two years. The conservative daily 7. Any kind of news about kidnappings 17. Criticisms challenging the regime, had refused to comply with the law or (even of children), unless it is formally the government, and the national secur dering self-censorship of the press, and its authorized by the federal police de ity. composing room had been occupied by partment. 18. To treat in a jocose; offensive, or federed police censors since August 1972. 8. Storming of any hideout of subver vulgar way the constituted authorities or Long columns of poetry became a fixture sives and armed resistance. the fatherland's symbols. in O Estado as the editors replaced cen 9. State of the documents concerning sored articles and advertisements with any lawsuit against subversives and ter 19. Sensationalistic news using vulgar verses from the epic poem Os Lusiadas. rorists, at any stage of the investigation words or exploiting scandals about sex [Although the poetry has temporarily or suit. It is specifically forbidden to pub ual perversions, pornographic or erotic disappeared from the pages of O Estado lish the names of civil or military author themes, and also obscene photos. and the government appears to have ities involved in the investigatioiL 20. Exploitation of crimes, hideous eased self-censorship guidelines, the sys 10. Criticism, direct or indirect, concern scenes, accidents, natural catastrophes, tem still prevails. Moreover, direct cen ing the censorship system and actions exhibition of mutilations (photos), or sorship continues at several Brazilian taken by censors, in any sector of their shocking events. publications, and the Geisel regime has work. 21. News about confiscation of maga made no move to revoke the 1970 law 11. Transactions carried out by the gov zines, books, or about direct censorship requiring prior approval of all pub ernment of the federal district concerning at newspapers and magazines. lications. the exchange of land for apartments. 22. Alarming news denouncing the [The following "list of forbidden topics" 12. Alarming news about the spreading presence of bombs or any other explo is an example of the communiques is of forged bills [money]. sives. sued from time to time by the federal 13. Decision of the censors to forbid 23. To talk about the former Ser police to regulate self-censorship. It was the theater play Calabar, the movie, or geant Manoel Raimundo Soares or his sent to the Brazilian press February 12, the record of the same name. This regu widow Elizabeth Challup Soares. 1974. lation refers to paid advertisements, re 24. News, commentaries, etc., referring [The Canadian Committee for Justice views, commentaries, or any other kind to proposals of granting honorary titles to Latin American Political Prisoners* ob of publicity. to high authorities being discussed at pro- tained a copy of the circular from opposi 14. Alarming and sensationalistic spec vincieil or municipal assemblies. tion circles in BrazU. The committee has ulation over the living and working con 25. Publication of any matter calling provided a translation of the document, ditions in the Northern and Northeastern to class struggle, strikes, or rebellions. which we are publishing below.] regions. Also the negative exploitation of Also forbidden is any call to racial or the Indian situation or the activities of social discrimination. the National Indian Foundation 26. Publication, mention, article, news, (FUNAI). etc., of an alarming character concern INTERNAL COMMUNIQUE 15. Exploitation or sensationalism in ing anonymous phone calls, bombs, ex DATE: February 12, 1974 volving homeless children. plosives, alarms, or fires in large high- RE: List of forbidden topics as determined 16. Alarming or provocative news rises [skyscrapers]. □ by General A Bandeira, general director of the Federal Police Department (BRASILIA). The Struggle for Kurdish Autonomy 1. Actions by security agents in order to prevent or repress activities against [ The following statement by J. Ali, Euro sympathy with Moscow, then an anti- the national security. pean representative of the Kurdish Demo Islamic movement, and finally, today, a 2. Arrest, death, criminal attempt, pub cratic party, appeared in the February movement working for the CIA. lic statement, document; trip, or informa issue of Le Peuple Breton, newspaper of I would like to point out that the truth tion concerning subversives, cassados the Union Democratique Bretonne The of the matter is that in the fourteen years [persons stripped of political rights], bani- UDB is a left nationedist group that has we have been fighting we have not changed dos [persons expelled from Brazil and been closely aligned with the French Com at aU. What has changed has been the nine denied their citizenship], or exiles. munist party since 1968. governments in Iraq, nine dictatorial gov 3. Information and opinions about ac [Footnotes were supplied by Le Peuple ernments that came to power through mili tivities of Don Helder Camara, Father Breton. The translation is by Intercon tary coups, employing the most brutal Jose Comblin, Father Casaldaliga, Fath tinental Press. ] methods. By way of contrast, the Kurd er Francisco Jentei. And any kind of state ish revolution, led by the Kurdish Demo ment from the CNBB [National Confer cratic party, defends not only the Kurd ence of Brazilian Bishops], whenever it ish people's right to freedom but also attacks the government. The nine Iraqi governments that have the rights of other parties and minorities, 4. Reillies organized abroad against come to power since 1961 have all used who are free to do as they wish in the BreizU, as for example the one that oc the same tactics against the Kurds. First liberated areas. This is the case; for exam curred in Belgium. they promise to make peacq to grant the ple; with the pro-Chinese Communist par 5. News about torture of prisoners, Kurds their rights. Then, as soon as they ty and with Arab movements. The same about hunger strikes, or about jail con feel strong enough, they try to take hack was true in the past for the pro-Soviet ditions. some of these rights by military means. Communist party, whose survivors came They make a series of accusations, calling to Kurdistan seeking refuge during the ♦P. O. Box 38, Station B, Toronto, On the Kurdish revolution afeudalmovement, period when the cry of the Iraqi govern tario. then a militant revolutionary movement in ment (the same government that is in pow- February 24, 1975 er today!) was "Kill every Communist perts."3 They project using the most sav ish students. This is the first time in the on sight." age means to repress an entire people, history of the Middle East that women The new phase of the war that has just including poison gas. At the same time have been hanged. This is how they are been launched against the Kurdish peo repression is deepening in Baghdad and repressing the Kurds. Meanwhile, the ple is more harsh and savage than ever, in the Kurdish regions under Iraqi con Iraqis talk about socialism, progress, and and there are several reasons for this. trol. They have hanged four young Kurd- a whole number of other fine words as First of all because the Soviet Union is they go about pursuing a course of geno backing the current Iraqi government to in military actions (bombings) against cide against the Kurds. the hut, providing it with ultramodern the Kurds. Such is the situation atpresent. □ heavy arms like the Tupolev-22 bomb ers, which are used to bomb Kurdish refugee camps from an altitude of 10,000 meters. In this connection, it is astonish a ra ing to see the Soviet Union, which talks about peace, the liberation of all nations, humanitarianism, and Marxism-Lenin- ism, enter the fray against a small nation that is fighting for its freedom and auton /Pfan in a New York prison: Our venture of trying to include in each omy (not even its independence'). The "After having reviewed a copy of your issue of Intercontinental Press a few trans Soviets are supporting a government that lations in Spanish has met with a favor publication that another brother happened seized power through a military coup and able response. Typical comment is the to have, I sincerely feel that your pub that only four or five years ago was mas following from G. B. in Colombia; lication offers the most thorough presen sacring Communists! "IP is very useful for us in providing tation and analysis of the worldwide fight The second reason for the brutality of against imperialism and all its neocolon- international news, information about the this war stems from the wealth the Iraqi activities of groups belonging to the ial lackeys. government has at its disposal from the Fourth International, and for political "I would therefore appreciate if you abrupt increase in petroleum revenue. 1 education. In a regional publication which woidd allow me to keep up with the revo Today it can buy men and arms,2 and use we are putting out, we have reproduced lutionary struggle; while I fight for my the oU as a means of blackmaU against various articles from IP. own immediate emancipation from within certain countries (Sweden, Switzerland, "We would like to suggest that you in these repressive walls." Austria, and Finland) in order to isolate crease the number of articles in Spanish. A reader in an Ohio prison, who wants the Kurdish movement and even prevent For us they are of great importance, since to help increase our circulation, sent the the intervention of humanitarian organi various worker companeros have diffi following note zations. culty reading English." "We have been receiving some issues of The war at present is extremely harsh. Another reader in Colombia, A. R., the Intercontinental Press. The paper is We have more than 100,000 refugees in stresses the "importance of two kinds of cool and we can relate to it. We would Iran, and more than 400,000 displaced articles that you offer: those written by like some more brothers to receive the persons who have left their vUlages and Ernest Mandel, Fidler, and others on in paper if possible. The names will be at who have come to liberated regions. The flation and the world recession; and those the end of the letter. Thank you." situation is extremely critical. People are relating to the struggles being carried on Since most prisoners are not in finan dying every day because of the weather, by the PST [Partido Socialista de los cial position to pay for their subscrip which is quite cold right now, and the Trabajadores] and the Argentine working tions, we accept donations to cover the humanitarian organizations themselves class. costs. If you would like to help out in are incapable of doing anything because "The first kind. . . appear as the only this, your contribution would be most of the oil blackmail. And all this has hap Marxist analyses of the world situation, welcome. pened in an epoch in which we hear talk at least within the internationally known The editor of the Bengali Trotskyist of the right of animals to exist. There tendencies of the left. publication Larai has asked us to inform are a great number of committees and "The second kind play a very important our readers that the publication has had organizations that protect animals, but role for socialists, that is, for those of to change its name to Srani-Dal-Biplab when it comes to the Kurds no one has us who see in Argentina a process filled (Class-Party-Revolution). anything to say. No one wants to help with lessons bearing on the Latin Amer "Larai had a long tradition of fighting for Trotskyism in India," he writes. "It them. Everyone says, "We know you are ican and world revolution." fought imperialism-capitalism on the one right and we are in sympathy with you, One of our readers in the U. S. armed but we can't do anything." And so two forces, Tony R., writes: "I have found hand and Steilinism on the other. It is or three million Kurds are abandoned your recent policy of including material perhaps known to many that West Bengal happens to be a bastion of Stalinism." in the isolated mountain regions, fighting in Spanish personally gratifying since Because of the abysmal level of poverty one of the biggest superpowers — the Spanish is my mother tongue and I thank in India, it is extremely difficult to get Soviet Union. you for that. I would also like to men out a publication of this kind regularly. In fact, we don't think this war is di tion a couple of other aspects of your pub The editor appeals for financial help. This rected against Iraq but against the Soviet lication and that is the section Around can be sent through the following address: Union. Iraq would never have been able the World, which gives us a good over Bengali c/o Internationalen, Box 3274, to fight the Kurds in this fashion if it all outlook on the various aspects of the 10365 Stockholm, Sweden. hadn't been for Soviet arms and "ex- struggle Also your section on documents is, for me, the most interesting in that 1. Most Iraqi oU wells are located in it allows me to understand the positions Kurdistan. of the various groups involved. I could go on about IP but I think you know how A subscription to Intercontinen 2. From France, in particular! I feel." tal Press is still a BEST BUY. From readers held in various prisons 3. There are at present a thousand of we continue to receive appreciative com Check rotes inside cover. them in Iraq, some of whom take part ments. Here is a typical note from an Intercontinental Press