U.S.

ASHINGTON’S threat to cut

off “U.S. aid” tc those coun-
tries trading with Cuba is losing its
punch. Britain’s Tory prime min-
ister is reported to have told U.S.
president Johnson that “‘it just
isn’t cricket old chap, what?” And
now comes Spain’s notorious dic-
tatcr Franco telling the U.S. much
the same thing, “aid or no aid,”
Spain will continue its cconsider-
able trade with Cuba.

Clearly, if the British “lion” is
going a shade mangy, the U.S.
“eagle” is positively moulting. In

‘the area of world trade imperialist

contradictions steadily sharpen,
and nowhere so much as in the
realm of trade. Business is busi-
ness, and to stay in business we
must trade where we can, and par-
ticularly in that great area of an
expanding Socialist world, which
imperialism nc longer dominates.
Even U.S. wheat deals with the
Soviet Unicn, and its mass dump-
ing of “aid”? commodities from as-
pirins to stale storage butter,
underscores the need.

But there is ancther and equally
important angle. Having included
“strategic” nuclear bases in its
“aid” to Britain, Spain and num-
erous other countries, Uncle Sam
faces the risk of being told to “get
these bases to hell out” if he gets
too belligerent on the matter of
trade. In point of fact, in ne coun-
try (including Canada) are U.S.
military bases there by ind with
the will and agreement of the
people, but only by the subservi-

- e e e
Pacific Tribune
Editor — TOM McEWEN
Associate Editor — MAURICE RUSH
Published weekly at
Room 6 — 426 Main Street
Vancouver 4, B.C.

Phone MUtual 5-5288
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EDITORIAL PAGE *

ee

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ie

- —ECCLES, Br. Daily Worker

‘aid’ discounted

ent agreement cf reactionary gov-
ernments acting in defiance of the
wishes of their peoples, (again asin
Canada).

Hence, the oft-touted “unity” of .
reactionary imperialism is some-
thing less than “‘skin deep,” with
the all-compelling need cf trade
inevitably cutting through its
“unity make-up.”

“Trading with the enemy” may
upset the U.S. “aid” applecart,
but it is the only way contending
imperialisms may survive—a little
longer; with “‘buses” having pricr-
ity over “bases.”

~“ tiglt the sellout’ —

HEN double-barelled port-
folia Minister of,Recreation
and Conservation, and Minister of
Mines and Petroleum, Kenneth
Kiernan, anncunced last week
that B.C.’s public parks would be
opened tolumber and mining
“free enterprise” for extractive ex-
ploitation, he not only got his port-
folias scrambled, but utilized one
to totally obliterate the intent of
the other.
Only in Socred ‘fast buck”
mentality can ‘.recreation and con-
servation” be construed to mean

' giving the resources of public parks

over to private moncpoly. —
Little wonder Mr. Roderick
Haig-Brown, cne of B.C.’s out-
standing conservationists, calls for
a quick “halt to the great Socred
sellout,” now crowned by Kier-
nan’s park giveaway announce-
ment.
Aside from “giving away” the
bulk of our vast natural resources,
timber, natural gas, the great Co-
lumbia River pctential, millions
of acres of forest resources, etc.,

to U.S. and home-grown monopoly

tycoons, now itis decreed by Kier-
nan and Company, that the re-.
mainder of cur provincial parks
be thrown in for good measure.
Moreover, it should be noted
that the Bennett Socred govern-
ment, with typical Socred cyni-
cism and arrogant disregard, either
for the Legislature or the people,
have already permitted the lum-
ber and mining barcns to get going
in the parks, even long before
Kiernan made his “‘official”’ an-
nouncement. In the Wells Gray
and Strathcona parks the “free
enterprisers”’ are already busy,
and for all the people know, prob-
ably in many other park areas.

But that is not all; as Mr. Haig-
Brown points out, during the past
two decades the total area of B.C.
provincial parks has been stripped
of approximately 6.5-million acres
from the original eleven million

Comment |

acres of park lands set aside for th
enjoyment (and enlightenment)!
this and succeeding generation®
With over one-half cf our pat
lands “dedicated to the people!
perpetuity” already gone, the
Kiernan Socred edict to let tht
mining and logging monopolies}
to the remaining acreage for 4.
customary Socred “‘fast buck
poses a two-pronged questl0
How long before B.C. has no Pt
vincial parks at all, or that what
is left will look more like a m?
opoly-created sewage dump
stead of a park? a9
Mining slag heaps or loggie
slash from “mature” or other qual
ity timber will add nothing to #
beauty of a natural park ort
conservation of its wild life, a
least of all to the people of t
and following generations,
whom provincial and fedel®
parks are a sacred temple, de®
cated to the preservation
natural beauty and majesty.
The Haig-Brown call to ha?
the great Socred sellout” muy
find a quick and ready echo in the
hearts and minds of all British ©
lumbians, not only to save oY
parks, but to save our provin®
from monopoly’s Socred brokel®
who boast their “prosperity by
the proceeds from the sale of th
peoples’ heritage.

“There are three ways in wht
to prepare and equip peoP
mentally, spiritually and mor
for war. The first is open glor
tion of war and soldering, the®

_ond is the creation of an atm?
phere of fear and hatred, and ¢
third is preparation of -pe®
minds for the idea that war 15?
evitable.”—(Dr. Katherine FU
of Dusseldorf, West Germany):

T has been said, ‘at the bottom

of every goldmine there is a ghost
town’’. Perhaps that should be re-
vised to include all mines, Even those
towns built in the 50’s to extract
uranium to feed Uncle Sam’s nuclear
bomb appetite, such as Uranium City
and Elliot Lake, are already well on
the way to becoming ‘‘Ghost Towns’’,

The December 1963 edition of the
‘‘British. Columbia Digest’’ magazine

Towns of the Kootenays’’. While the
author waxes eloquently emotional
about ‘*the people who once lived in
the old town—the pioneer, gold miner,
outlaw, dancehall girl—walking along
board or dirt sidewalks amid the roar
of squeaking wagon wheels, snorting
horses, saloon music ee etGe
he misses one significant point, often
well expressed by B.C. oldtimers;
“*they came to rape this country, to
take all they could get as fast as
they could get it, and get out’’. The
“Ghost Town" is al! they left behind
to mark their trail of exploitation.
And “they’’, who were ‘‘they?”’
Every Ghost Town had its “ company’’,
its ‘mine owners”’, sometiies resi-
‘dent, often absentee, whose prime con-
cern for the pioneer community was

how much wealth could be extracted,

features a lengthy article entitled ‘‘Ghost

On that principle the town ‘‘lived’’,
When extraction died, the town died
with it. : é
Extract the romantic twaddle from
our vast crop of ‘*Ghost Towns’? in
B.C, alone, and a rather sordid pic-
ture remains. A picture not unrelated
to the monopoly extraction policies of
today, which not only produces ‘**Ghost
Towns’ in abundance, but bids fair,
unless checked in time, to transform
Canada into one huge ‘*Ghost Town’’,

marking the trail of a predatory U.S, _

monopoly in its lust for dominant pow-
er and profits.

Sprinkled throughout our rich ‘‘heri- |

tage’’ of ‘*Ghost Towns’’ in B.C. we
have some very special ones, the kind
which none of us, and expecially or-
ganized labor can feel very proud of.
These are the Chinese ‘*Ghost Towns’’,
the product of an early Canadian
*fapartheid’*, into which we herded
our Chinese-Canadian brethern, to as-
sure that we superior whites would
not be contaminated, socially, econ-
omically, or union-wise with the‘ Yel-
low Peril’.

Here is an excerpt from a letter
from one union local secretary to

another dated May 29, 1912, (not so °

long ago?) which tells its own story:—

“IT enclose herewith a copy of Res-
olution covering the ‘‘Chinese Cook”
question, adopted at our regular meet-
ing on Saturday, May 25, I was in-
structed to suggest to your Local the
advisability of taking similar aetion

within your jurisdiction, and to further

say, that this is the only feasable
manner, in our opinion, by which you
can assist us in an effort to make this

“Ghost Towns’, highly symboli¢ q

Tourist attraction’’.

celebrations or ‘tourist attraction®

» gold along with the dross.

“ped the Bennetts of that day ‘dead

portion of British Columbia, a whit
Man’s country’. (Emphasis theirs). ”
may be added that both areas of ‘ju?
isdiction’’ have long since becom

‘*a white man’s country’’. a
We note there is some talk in ci¥!
circles up Cumberland way to “*P val
serve that historic coal mining cente! ’
Chinese “Ghost Town’? as a ‘Ce
tennial project’? and/or as an ad

That might not be a bad idea PFO |
vided the real history of its origi?
the economic and racial persecutl?
of its inhabitants, and the indomital! |)
will of the latter to survive, is #
made known to the inquiring ‘tourist
Then at least the preservation of ©
“‘Ghost Towns’? will serve the cal"
of enlightenment and truth, rather th?
the sophisms of romantic guff. :

If we must project our crop of Gh®
Towns"’ into the area of “Centennial

let us portray some of the trage
along with the glamor, some of

Let us remember that in some
the “Ghost Towns’? up Carbou W®
it was the unity and determinatio?
the Caribou gold miners which sto

their tracks when they .attemptes
‘sive’ B,C. (and Canada) to the U:
annexationists, That phase of “Gh®
Town’? history would stand us in 8
stead today, as our resources, Y
jobs and our country are being 2
down the river to U.S. monopoly ©
a fast buck—a sure guarantee of MN
‘Ghost Towns’? to come. d

Sete ee ee naa . we

February 28, 1964—PACIFIC TRIBUNE