LPP ae returns from extensive tour

Buck finds ‘confidence, security,

beauty and joy’ in Soviet Union

By JOHN STEWART

I was not the first reporter to in-
terview Tim Buck, national leader
of the Labor-Progresive party, on
his return last week from his
three-months tour of England, the
People’s Democracies and the So-
viet Union. .

A writer from a Canadian maga-
zine had seen him first and finish-
ed off his questions with: ‘Mr.
Buck, tell me: do they really get
enough to eat in Russia?”

Tim Buck laughed when he told
me about it — and he laughted at
his questioner.

“Why,” he said, “not only are
they the best fed people in aii
Europe, but when I dined witi
workers in the factories I visited
I remarked that they’d be eating
themselves into an early grave if
they didn’t watch out.”

And he himself gained a few
extra pounds — and looks wonder-
fully fit after his long tour.

I asked him what impressed him
most on this trip — for this time
he travelled extensively — as com-
pared with his last visit to Moscow
four years ago.

He thought for a moment.

“4 think | would say that it
was the supreme happiness of
the people and the breathtaking-
ly . beautiful things they are
building.. That plus a feeling of
impatience with the cold war
which takes away some of their
resources and energies from the
tremendous projects they are
undertaking in every part of the
country,

‘.

“The millions of people I
and the hundreds I talked with ex-
pressed a joy and confidence even
greater than I had noted last time
I was there. They seemed much
more relaxed and secure.”

“Why would this be?”

“Well, it’s quite evident that it
springs from the fact that the
struggle for post-war construction
and expansion has been success-
fully carried through. The Five
Year Plan has been surpassed.
That is an occasion for celebration
and the planning of even greater
tasks.

“These people no longer know
the meaning of insecurity. There
are no layoffs, no signs of economic
crisis and depression, no war
hysteria, in ‘the Soviet Union or
the People’s Democracies. No
wonder they’re full of confidence.”

He told me about May Day in
Moscow. and the two million peo-
ple who marched through Red
Square that day.

“[’ve seen Moscow May Days be-
fore, but this year there was some-
thing new. I think the most obvi-
ous thing were the flowers — mil-
lions upon millions of them, al-
most overshadowing the floats and

im

ee

|

‘
\
}

TIM BUCK

Every delegation carried
huge displays and every marcher
wore a bouquet. And the effect of
this. was paralleled by that expres-
sion of such sheer joy and | con-
fidence that one has to see and feel
to fully believe.”

banners,

In this country, I said, the re-

‘replied.

ports of the May Day parade give
an impression that they are domi-
nated by the military. Is that true?

“Only about 40 minutes of the
parade was military,’ Tim Buck
“And overhead there was
a thrilling. display of new Soviet
jet planes flving at the speed of
sound at little more than roof-top
level. The Soviet people have a
‘great affection for their defense
forces — but wish they weren’t
necessary.” ©

He described the new Moscow
— “like a brand new city since I
was there four years ago, by con-
trast with, say, London.”

“It is very beautiful. It is being
remodelled according to a master
plan, with large open green spaces

_jand great wide thoroughfares they

call ‘vistas’ — and believe me, they
are. The buildings are enormous
and yet great care is taken that
size does not become the main
|characteristic. Beauty with utility
is the aim.” /

What about the charge often
made by some newspaper reports
that Moscow. may be fine, but it’s

only the showplace? I asked him.
“That’s nonsense. | saw the
same development in Rostov,

Kiev, Kharkov, Lwow and nu-
merous other cities and towns as
far down as Taganrog on the Sea
of Azov. | saw it as | travelled

“On May Day there was a thrilling display of new Soviet
have a great affection for their defense forces—but wish they we

down the Volga. ;

| Moscow’s.

ful job of reconstruction

; Waterway,

“In Leningrad almost everyone |
you speak to, including the work-
ers in the plants, start trying to
impress on you that their new sub-
way which will open next May Day
will be ‘even more beautiful’ than
In Kiev, the people say
‘haven't we done a more beauti-
than
Moscow?’

“But of course the best refuta-
tion of this propaganda is provid-
ed by the really stupendous pro-
jects of which the Soviet people
are so proud, These are not in
Moscow but spread all over the
country, from the Arctic circle to
the Caspian Sea.”

He told me of the new inland
power -and __ irrigation
system that now stretches 3,000
miles to connect the White, Baltic,
Caspian and Azov seas.

“It’s like extending the St.
Lawrence Seaway system west to
the Saskatchewan River right to
the Rockies,” is the way he relat-
ed it to Canada and what could
be done here.

This waterway carries ceal and
iron ore from the Donbas to Lenin-
grad and the forest products of
Karelia to the Caucasus, the
Ukraine and the eastern shores of
the Caspian.

“The Volga has become a high-
way, teeming with freight — and
it leads iout at both ends to the
ports of the world. At the same
time it provides hydro electric
power for industry and irrigation
for what was previously arid land.

“IT was particularly impressed by

jet planes . . . the Soviet people
ren‘t necessary.”

the change brought about in agyi-
cultur on the lands bordering on
-Tsimlyanska Lake, the great’ arti-
|ficial lake they built that is about
,as big as ‘Lake Erie. The land it
has opened up to mixed farming
was similar to the dry areas south
of the CPR in Saskatchewan and
Alberta. :

“Tt is a completely new lake, the
creation of Soviet engineering in-
spired by the grandiose concept of
applying science and technique to
enrich the country.”

He told me a little story that il-
lustrates how the Soviet people
view their great projects.

His ship was standing at the
ninth Lock in the Volga-Don. A
13-year-old Cossack girl heard him
speaking and walked up to him,

“Excuse me, comrade,” she said
in' English, “where did you learn
{o speak English so perfectly?”

“At home in Canada,” he re-
plied. ~

“Oh,” she said, “and how does
the Welland Canal compare with
our Volga Don? Is it true that
our locks lift ships twice as high
as Niagara Falls?”

He got into quite a complicated
discussion trying to translate the
77 metre lift up from the Volga
into feet. He finally made the
claim that Niagara was 50 metres
high, but she quickly corrected
him: “Can it be that our’ school
books are wrong? I thought Ni-
(The actual

agara was 160 feet.’

Niagara Falls drop is 167 feet, and
the total drop ‘between Lake Erie
and Lake Ontario, which the Wel-
land Canal and locks compensate,
is 326 feet.)

By this time the ship was leaving
and all Tim Buck had time to shout
was: “Let’s agree that the Welland
Canal and the Volga Don are both
wonderful!”

Many so-called experts over
here are claiming that there’s a
crisis in Soviet agriculture, so I
asked Buck to comment. *

“There is absolutely no truth it

such statements whatsoever — So-
cialist agriculture has solved the
problem of an abundance of food
—in marked contrast to pre-social-
ist conditions. Soviet agriculture,
of course, is faced with new tasks
and big changes are taking place.

“Whereas in the past the great
majority of all the people were en-
gaged in agriculture, today there
are 60,000,000 in. industry and
millions more in new urban occu-
pations., And that number is grow-
ing. The smaller number of peo-
ple remaining in agriculture are in
the process of raising the produc-
tivity of the land and the variety
of crops for both food and in-
dusfry.

“The diet of the peoples of the
USSR is changing from’ cereals to
meat. Industry. jis making tremen-
dous demands, Thus, the problems
of Soviet agriculture are distinctly
those of expansion.”

He told: me of the

opening of
new lands to farming.

“They asked for 150,000 young |

People to volunteer. In a month
over 450,000 had put their names
down to go’into the Virgin lands
east of the Urals and begin a
new life. It’s just like asking
15,000 Canadian youth to go into
the rich lands of the Peace River
country and open them up to
agriculture and industry. These
young adventurers» are supplied
with everything. It is socialist
Pioneering — somewhat differ-
ent to the life of the Pioneers
who opened the Canadian West.

“And this is just a beginning,
The plan is to open up 30,000,000
acres of virgin land to agricul-
ture.”

He described scenes of
ands of people working on
great tree-belts — and doing it on
their day off from work, “Not only
for the watersheds they form, but

for the beauty they rovid
their lands.” Soa ee

thous-
their

I returned to an earlier remark

1 ae 2 4 ee Ps pre -E 1
PACIFIC TRIBUNE — AUGUST 6, 1954 — PAS™

SSS

“Do they really get enough to eat in Russia?
Russians are the best fed’ people in all Europe.”

Why, the

that the people felt some we
patience with the cold war and &
‘ed the LPP leader about it.
replied: to
| “Almost everyone I spoke ©
about the magnitude of their gk:
‘war projects expressed that f

a
‘ing — that they could do a 2

|déal more if only the peoples e
the world and especially 3% fs
West ,would compel their ae
ments to agree to gradual dis?
ment.” t
“Are the people concerned abou
the possibility of war?” Se
“Well, mala know it’s a remare
able thing. The demand for P°
is sO universal in the Soviet Oar
that it even overshadows ‘ 0
great pride in the achievements nd
their armies ‘in World War J 10
their confidence in their ability *
successfully defend their land +
should be invaded again. They ae
impatient to bring to reality ' ape
great dream of the complete er Bi
formation of their society t sous
munism. And they spend pree pos
little time worrying about the P™
sibility of war.
a ‘teil you that if any woul
be rulers of the world ovens
tempt to: destroy what he ae
building, these people will ids
like a mother fighting for
child.” :

Color TV in USSR

LoNnDON
ex

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her

_ The Soviet Union is to start
perimental color television |
casts on November 7—the a0
sary of the October Revolutio™

This was announced here
week by Sergei Novakovsky, © jon

ty director of Moscow’s telev

ver

5 A ie n
gates attending a television ei :
national study course here-

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5 ele
centre and one of two RussiO? ig