Fan war hysteria in China

MOSCOW

Additional restrictions on tra-
vel by foreign diplomats and
journalists were introduced in

lina on the eve of the new year
a earlier issued permits for
trips across the country were re-
scinded. The France Presse
Agency reported that Peking’s
diplomatic sources explained this
measure by “extended war pre-
parations.” Judging from foreign
press reports, Peking-conducted
“defence measures” are clearly
designed to: stir up artificial war
hysteria. Military authorities are
compelling the population to dig
slit trefiches and shelters in
courtyards. Another cut in food
rations is motivated by the need
to lay in-stocks against. war.

But at the same time the Mao-
ist propaganda seizes on every
pretext to bring home to the
population that the Chinese na-
tion armed with Mao Tse-tung’s

ideas need not fear war. These -

purposes, incidentally, are serv-
ed by criticisms in Peking news-
papers of the films “Soldiers
Outside the City,” “The Battle
of Shanghai,” and others made
in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
These pictures devoted to opera-
tions of the People’s Liberation
Army contained elements of a
realistic depiction of the war
and associated hardships. Now,
however, this approach to war
has been declared “poisonous
grass of pacifism and defeatism”
by the Maoists. The films were
banned from screens at the out-
set of the “cultural revolution.”

The present criticism of the

films filling whole pages in-

Peking newspapers is only a pre-
text for glorification of militar-
ism and chauvinism in the spirit
of the Mao ideas.

In an article entitled “Two
Diametrically Opposite Views on
War,” Jenminh Jihpao wrote on
Dec. 24 that war, although in-
volving some destruction, brings
“emancipation” to the world and

Theatre Review

complete victory to the ideas of
Mao Tse-tung. The rejected films
are contrasted by the paper with
the productions staged by Mao
Tse-tung’s wife—Chiang Ching
— the ballet “The Women’s Red
Battalion” and several operas
which portray war as a merry
holiday.

The Maoists, while whipping
up chauvinistic sentiments and
war hysteria, are going ahead
with their anti-Soviet slandering.
They want the Chinese people
to believe that the U.S.S.R. “in
collusion with American im-
perialism and international re-
action” (meaning India and
Japan) is carrying out a policy
of “surrounding China” and is
even going to attack China sup-
posedly to “restore the capitalist
system there.”

Phoney fabrications like these
have been repeated by Peking
propaganda for several years

FRANCO'S POSITION

now, but of late it has been done
increasingly noisily. On Jan. 1
Jenminh Jihpao, Theafan Chun-
pao and the magazine Hungchi
carried an instructive article
abounding in particularly mali-'
cious anti-Soviet attacks. This
article contains a call. by Mao
Tse-tung “to start preparations
from today” to repulse “aggres-
sion.” Today all propaganda fa-
cilities are directed towards the
explanation of ‘“Mao’s_instruc-
tions.” In one of its numerous
reviews of responses to the New
Year article the Hsinhua News
Agency reported how propagan-

dists from army units, disregard-

ing weather and time, are mak-
ing rounds of villages and camps
of cattle breeders in areas bor-
dering on the Soviet frontiers,
explaining “Mao’s latest direc-
tives” to the population.

In the opinion of foreign ob-
servers, the Peking leaders are
deliberately creating an atmos-
phere of a “besieged fortress” in
the country in order to weaken
the serious economic and politi-
cal difficulties and the growing

discontent within the country. ’

These conclusions are confirmed
in fact by Peking propaganda,
too. Thus, the Maoist press and
radio are continuously referring
to an “external menace,” de-
manding greater army control
over industry, agriculture and
the country’s entire social life.
By references to “the thneat of
attack” the Maoists are backing
up their pleas to workers to fol-
low the example of Dachin oil
workers and themselves to pro-
cure their food and-calls on peas-
ants to do without manufactured
goods. “Don‘t be afraid of diffi-
culties,” “Do not fear disasters”
and “Prepare for hunger and
war” are slogans most often re-
peated now in China.

Maoist propaganda is using

Osborn in the New Republic (U.S.A.) the “external threat” also to

overcome split and bickering.

within its own ranks. The scale

HAIR—YOUTH IN DESPAIR

A dozen cities throughout the
world have seen Hair, the
“American tribal-love rock musi-
cal,” and now, at the Royal
Alexandra Theatre, Torontonians
are paying $3.50 for the cheapest
Sunday matinee seat, $5 for other
days and a $10 top.

Hair, in its formless, plotless
way, has something to say and
says it, especially in its second
part, with frankness, with urgen-
cy and with impact..

It‘ is against the materialist .
greed, the church, the advertis-
ing, the educational system, the
morality and the sexual customs
of U.S. society. Above all it is
against the U.S. war machine.

It is the outcry of the bewil-
dered, disenchanted, cynical and
hopeless hippie kids who think
they have escaped from the sys-
tem, but who have instead ended
up in a dead-end of animal vege-
tation, casual sex, drugs and pri-
mitive communes — physically
and emotionally undernourished
and clinging to each other for
some sort of pathetic comfort in
their common confusion.

Hair is a desperate plea from
the young to the young, but it
also adresses their seniors and
the message is not a very friend-
ly one. When you remember that
half.of North America’s popula-
tion is under 25—the big market
for clothes, cars, travel, liquor,
food and shelter—and that it is
under massive, non-stop pres-

sure to buy the American way of
life, then you can understand the
revulsion of those kids who cop
out, wear rags, live like beggars;
and you become more sensitive
to the hostility that proclaims
the “generation gap,” that ac-
cuses the parents of selling the
children to Mammon.

The question is: How many of
the audience get the signal? And
how many realize that the cul-
tural and moral sickness that
pervades the U.S.A. seeps into
every corner of Canada as well?

And the question is: Can the
problems of being young in 1970
be solved by the young alone?

Hair raises issues. But Hair
compromises its statement with,
I suspect, an eye on the box of-
fice. How else explain the repeat-
ed outbreaks of four-letter
coarseness, the crudely-simulated
sex acts, the repulsive perver-
sions and the quite-pointless
nudity? Too often the show’s
deeper meaning is smeared with
steamy stag-night, privy-wall,
burlesque - house pornography
that has no valid purpose.

Hair also lacks discipline in its
writing and staging. There is al-
together tog much unrelieved
sound, too many blinding strobe
lights, too much repetition. At
least 30 minutes could be cut to
good advantage.

The music carries the evening,
but Hair also has visual treats,
color and movement and a stu-

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 30, 1970—Page 10

pendous stage setting that is a
melange of a civilization’s com-
mercial junk.

The writing is so-so. Many of
the gags and situations derive
from old-time burlesque rou-
tines. The lyrics are not clearly
articulated.

But much of the production is
beautiful. The opening scene,
the gathering of the “tribe”
from all levels on and off the
stage, is a symphony in slow
motion. The reading of Hamlet’s
speech, ‘What a piece of work is
man,” is movingly presented.
The end-of-the-world build-up of
nuclear destruction is a powerful
blending of chorus and dynamic
action..

But negating the positive
things are the animal violence,
the male supremacy behavior
that reduces a girl to a public
sex convenience, the -nihilism,
the defeatism, the incoherence.

Hair is a show about the de-
feated, an exhibitionism for the
leering tourist. It does not, des-
pite its eloquence, inspire the
dreamer, nor uplift the victim,
nor touch the conscience, nor
anger the meek. It offers no hope
for the young, only despair. And
if the young have no future,
what hope is there for the rest
of us?

—Martin Stone

In Bulgaria, as in most coun-
tries of the world, cancer is a
pressing problem for the health
services. The incidence» of can-
cer is 170 per 100,000. Skin can-
cer is the most widespread—one-
third of all the cases of cancer
being of this type. The incidence
of cancer of the stomach is the
second highest (23.5 per 100,-
000). Of late, this type of tumour
has been successfully treated at
the Sofia Oncological Institute
(even in the advanced stages of
the disease with metastases in
the adjacent organs, until re-
cently regarded as hopeless). An
increase in cancer of the lungs
has been noted, particularly in
industrial towns. In Sofia it al-
ready ranks first in frequency
among the malignant tumours.
Only 25.6 percent of the patients
who were suffering from this
type of cancer and who were
treated in the Oncological Insti-
tute, were non-smokers.

Research work has confirmed
the fact that incidence of can-

cer of the mammary gland has

risen, especially among women
living in towns.

Bulgarian scientists are mak-
ing their contributions to the
struggle against cancer.

Dr. Endicott describes |
revolution in Sudan

The first meeting in Africa of
the Presiding Committee (Execu-
tive) of the World Council of
Peace took place last ‘month in
Khartoum, Sudan. Member of
the Presiding Committee of the
WCP and chairman of the Cana-
dian Peace Congress, James G.
Endicott reports briefly on the
meeting in the current Peace

Letter, information bulletin of

the Congress:

“The first thing that greeted
the members of the Presiding
Committee were huge signs say-
ing ‘Sudan is for Peace, Progress
and Socialism.’ There has been
a revolution, known as the May
25 Revolution. It was initiated
by young army Officers, many of
whom had come up from the
ranks and are from poor fami-
lies. There is now intense politi-
cal activity to build a mass base
of support for the new order.
There is a good chance that this
effort will succeed. Of course
there are powerful forces both
within and without the country
which will try to overthrow the
new revolutionary regime.
Shortly before we arrived, so we
were told, an American plane
had crashed in the desert, the
pilot had been captured and it
was found that he was doing
reconnaissance with reactionary
forces. He said ‘he lost his way.’

“The President of the Revolu-
tionary Council and Prime Min-
ister Gafar Nimeri came to the
opening meeting to give an ad-
dress of welcome and gave a re-
ception at which he decorated
the World Council with the
‘Order of the Two Niles.’ He was
presented with the Joliot-Curie
Gold Peace Medal.

“After the meetings of the
Council a large delegation was
flown to the south to Juba in
the Equatorial Province. There
has been a terrible civil war in
these regions. A genuine effort

The research work done ?
Professor Raiko Raichev on @
ultra-structural changes in
cell in the emergence of Pl
ment tumours and on the 1)
of the hormonal factor in its @
velopment has aroused great #
terest. He succeeded in est#l
lishing a number of regularitl®
in the transformation of norm
pigments into malignant
and has proved that the form!
tion of pigment depends on ¥
stage of cell maturity. Profes®
Raichev was the first to est
lish that the emergence of ¢#
cer is connected with distul!
ances in the hormonal balail
of the organism. He recommel™
greater attention to hormd®
preparations in the treatment”
cancer. For his research in
field, Professor Raichev has b&
awarded a prize by the Inter
tional Union. Against Cancer 4”
has been elected a member 0
number of foreign acade
(including that of New York!”

Another Bulgarian scien?
K. Hristov, has shown that
prolonged action of radioacl”
iodine 131 (alone or in combil!
tion with other substances UW”
in the treatment of thyrot0
cosis) causes tumours of
thyroid.

on

by the new Revolutionary Col”
cil is now being made to ov’
come the injustices and sull\
ings caused by the war. The ©
ritory of Sudan, especially ©
south, is of great strategic vay
to the imperialists who are =

trying to maintain control /
Africa. There are seven or elf
states bordering on that part)

Sudan known as the sour

Those who are trying to ma!
tain the old colonial and se!
colonial order in Uganda, Ch
Belgian Congo, etc., will @
tinue to attempt counter-rev™
tion in Sudan. |
“The documents of the me
ing are too voluminous to reP
duce in full. Many were a Tre
tition of the points of view Ff
out by the World Assembly
Berlin. There were how®\
some new emphases. The de@”
ration on the Portuguese ©
nies, Mozambique, Angola *
Guinea gave full support to"
armed struggle for liberatl
‘encouraged them to contily
their actions in order to ©
liberty and peace for their P
ples,’ and said, ‘the World Cl”
cil of Peace undertakes to spl
information to the world ane”
fluence public opinion ‘in fa"
of their struggle.’

“Point 8 of the resolution
Zimbabwe, South Africa %
Namibia reads: ‘This Confer
of the Presidential Committe®,
the World Council of Peace 4
equivocally maintains that %
intransigence of the fascist,
Zimbabwe, South Africa
Namibia can only be solve@ —
means of armed struggle.

“It can be seen from this
the old question of the relat!
of the armed struggle of col!
peoples to the struggle for
armament and co-existen
still on the agenda of his’
and the struggle for peace-

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