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ence against fascism upon which hopes rested for
C99réssive Sie disintegrated as world capitalism replaced it
sm, ©cs and pacts aimed, once again, at destroying

and it became clear to western
strategists that the USSR would
no longer stand alone as it had
done for 23 years.

Hopes for continuation of the
Anglo-British-Soviet alliance in-
to the post-war period faded
quickly. The 1945 Potsdam Con-
ference which agreed to strip
Germany of its war potential

was not four months old be-.

fore the United States and
Britain tried to scuttle it under
the pretext that Germany’s war
industries were needed to re-
build her economy: In 1945 the
USSR warned that the capitalist
states were aiming to replace
the wartime coalition as the
hub of the new United Nations
with an Anglo-U.S.-French alli-
ance.
Soviet warning hits
the mark

Consider how true is this
Soviet warning, made in 1945,
when looked at in 1974. The
USSR charged that the emerg-
ing capitalist bloc had as its
main aims:—‘“the revival of
German militarism;

—stopping the tide of demo-
cratic and socialist advance in
Europe;

_ —the maintenance of Japan
as an imperilalist watchdog in
Asia;

—the suppression of growing
anti-colonialist struggles.”

As if to deliberately make a
shambles out of Gayn’s theory
about the peaceful intent of
capitalism toward the USSR,
events following World War
Two moved along quickly. In
1946 Churchill’s infamous’ “Iron
Curtain” speech described the

final breakdown of the old war-—

time alliance and the start of the
cold war as we know it. The old
warhorse outlined the “con-
tainment of communism” and
“rollback” policy to come. He
signalized the sudden ~- turn

which resulted in open warfare |

on socialist ideas, spy scares,
imprisonment of communists
and the outlawing of parties.
His speech was greeted by the
pack of anti-Soviet, anti-com-
munist thugs, including the
Canadian ruling class and its
media.

An important Western strat-
egy was nuclear blackmail with
the destruction of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki being Truman’s
ace-in-the-hole in future deal-
ings with the Soviet Union. Calls
for the placing of the awesome
nuclear weapon under United
Nations’ control were ignored.
When in 1949 the USSR re-
iterated its call for the outlaw-
ing of nuclear arms and for the

signing of a peace pact, Ameri-
can Officials replied cynically,
“js the same worn old story

In. a real sense, they were
right—it was, the same story.
It’s the point Gayn misses. The
USSR fighting doggedly for
peace pacts, arms control, nor-
malization, — detente, and~ the
capitalist nations sabotaging
every move and creating the
groundwork for decades of wars
and arms races in their effort

‘to contain and roll back social

advance. everywhere.

The Western offensive

These two opposite trends
continued to quicken, The West
formed NATO, SEATO, CENTO
and a bevy of war pacts aimed
against the socialist world. They
spent over $12-billion on the
Marshall: Plan in Europe to
“restore economic health to Free
Europe and halt the march of
Communism.” They invaded
Korea in 1950 as an answer to
the victory of the Chinese revo-
lution a year earlier. When
French colonialism was buried
at Dienbienphu in May 1954 the
United States stepped in and is
still subverting the Vietnamese
struggle for independence. The
capitalist reply to growing na-
tional feelings in the Mid-East
was a direct attack in 1956 on
Egypt by British, French and
Israeli forces.

This massive, concerted effort
failed to stop the historical
process. Socialism is strong and
growing stronger. The national
liberation struggles are advanc-
ing everywhere and colonial
empires collapsing. - Together
with this world-wide process,
the years of principled, consis-
tent effort by the USSR which
today we call detente and peace-
ful coexistence is bearing fruit.
What Lenin described as the
“peaceful co-habitation” of
states with differing social sys-
tems is under way. The main
tendency in world development
is turning from cold war and
confrontation to detente and

cooperation.

An important part of Western
post-war strategy centred on nu-

‘clear blackmail with Truman’s

destruction of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki being their ace-in-the-
hole. Repeated Soviet calls for
crms control and peace agree-
ments were met with distain and
nuclear threats.

E t ] t as . I es
ast-Wes cooperation, as in the planned joint space program,
points up what is Pp ssible between st w

10: ates hen detente replaces

Gayn’s third article belittling
the Soviet economy is a clever
smokescreen. The main brunt is
examples of inefficiency (fac-
tories turning out suits with
two left sleeves, TV sets that
project no image, etc.) and his
general conclusion that the So-
viet consumer, by demanding
more and better goods, has

pressured the government into .

a detente posture.

No exhaustive study of the
USSR’s economic path since
1917 is possible here, although
volumes of figures and anaysis
are available and are being pro-
duced daily. However, some
basic truths should be stated.

_ USSR's industrial advance

From the period 1917 to 1937,
notwithstanding the terrible
backwardness of old Russia and
years of war and blockade, the
USSR’s industrial output rose

by 700%. But it’s important to.

bear in mind that, in addition to
dramatically increasing. produc-
tion and building heavy industry
from the ground up where none
existed, socialist economic
policy includes much more—

- education, medical care, hous-

ing, social legislation—a whole
new system to provide for
people’s basic needs.

They had no sooner developed
their industry and agriculture
when Hitler attacked. And,
while the Western powers grew
rich and powerful, the devasta-
tion wrought on’ the USSR was
incredible—1,710 cities and
towns destroyed along with
70,000 villages and 31,850 indus-
trial enterprises. Gone were 750
machine tool plants, 60 power
stations, 40,000 miles of rail-
way, 56,000 miles of roads,
98,000 collective farms and 1,870
state farms. Over 20 million
Soviet citizens died.

Gayn talks only about defici-
encies and problems. If he were
honestly interested ~ in such

questions he could discuss these
matters with Soviet economic
planners who deal with prob-
lems every day. The USSR dis-
cusses them, proposes solutions,
develops long-term projections
as well as being vitally con-
cerned with such questions as
waste, inefficiency and poor
quality.

But whatever a “suit with two
left sleeves” has to do with the
USSR’s position as the second
industrial power on earth, rising
in an historically short time
from a peasant economy, must
escape the honest reader.

Secret economic study
_Gayn quotes “an authorita-
tive Western study of global
economy in»1972 not available
to the public’: (very handy) as
pegging the USSR’s growth rate
at 1.5%. Soviet figures  (avail-
able to the public) tell another
story. .

“In the USSR the yearly in-
dustrial growth averaged 8.6%
(1961-65); 85% (1966-70) and
is to reach 8% (1971-75).
These figures are considerably
above (2.3 times for 1951-72)
the rates of industrial growth
of the U.S.A... . whereas in
1922, the initial year of its
peaceful development, Soviet
Russia’s industrial output -was
as little as 2.6% of the Ameri-
can level, the present Soviet
figure exceeds 75% of American
industrial production. .. .”

* a %

If Mark Gayn were to write
a series of three thousand
articles he could not ‘change
history. Detente, arms controls,
trade, -cultural and technical
exchanges, travel and all the
benefits derived for working
people everywhere from this
sccialist policy is being under-
stood in spite of hacks who
twist the truth and mislead their
readers.

Z

Tetreating the rubble
ie armies

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, APRIL 19, 1974—PAGE 7