GUS HALL

Gus Hall, general secretary of the Commu-
nisi Party, made this speech at a meeting of
solidarity with the Chilean Communist Party
held in New York City on Séptember 25. Other
speakers were James E. Jackson, secretary of
the Party’s International Affairs Commission,
and Grace Mora Newman, currently her Party's
candidate for lieutenant governor of New York.

By Gus Hall

henever there is new revolutionary experience it is’
necessary to study it and draw all conclusions
from it. The developments in Chile are a new revolution-
ary experience. I will probe these new experiences with
you, but before we do, we in the United States must real-
ize that the source of the danger to the electoral victory
of the Chilean people is here!

The most crucial matter to us is that Washington,
D.C. is the center — the world center — of counter-revolu-
tion. It is the direct representative of the corporate
trusts, world corporations, Rockefellers and Duponts
who are calling the shots in the invisible government —
the National Security Council — about the matters in
Chile.

The Central Intelligence Agency has its special
Chilean department and frankly, the question is not
whether they will try to overthrow the electoral mandate
in Chile, the question is how and when.

We cannot forget that in the very same days when
President Kennedy was issuing his statements about the
Alliance for Progress about great friendship for the
South American people, he was conferring with high
U.S. government officials whether or not to murder
Fidel Castro. The possible assassination of the newly
elected president of Chile no doubt is being discussed in
Washington now. The revelations about Kennedy’s plan
to get Fidel Castro murdered should destroy some of the
dangerous illusions about the nature of U.S. imperialism.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18 1970—PAGE 6

You can be sure they are discussing how to undo this
meaningful electoral victory. They are discussing wheth-
er they should give Argentina and Brazil one or two bil-
lion dollars to create border incidents to create the ex-
cuse to invade with the United States’ support.

They are discussing whether Brazil or Argentina
cannot do in Chile what Israel is doing in the Mideast.
U.S. imperialism is a master at this type of tactic. And
they are discussing whether the preferable tactic would
be to get the Chilean military — to promise them any-
thing they want — to get them to take power.

What is important for us to realize is that, whatever
the decisions and the plans, the money for the counter-
revolutionary attempt is coming from Washington, D.C.
This is now the world center of counter-revolution. Just
this week a’new element was revealed in.the advanced
imperialist planning and aggression: the invisible gov-
ernment has secret panels for each crisis area. These
panels sit in permanent session and plan. They make the
decisions, including decisions for military action in these
crisis areas. This system of active panels in session was
revealed regarding the developments in the Middle East.
You may be sure the panel on Chile has been and is in
session for some time. Therefore our task here in the
United States is to stay the ugly hand of imperialist ag-
gression against the progressive revolutionary electoral
victory in Chile.

It has been obvious for some time to most that the
Chilean election was not an ordinary election. The Chil-
ean electoral developments were the handwriting on the
wall for imperialism, and especially for U.S. imperial-
ism. Fear about this election has been mounting in the
ruling class circles for some time. Everybody has sensed
that not just the future of Chile is involved here. Every-
body has known that what takes place in Chile will have
repercussions, first of all, in all of Latin America. There-
fore the ruling class circles have had good reason to
fear the Chilean elections. :

This election marks the appearance. of a new devel-
opment in the class struggle and, because of this, there is
panic in ruling class. circles. For this reason ‘they are
openly saying that ‘‘it must not be permitted.’’ This con-
cept has appeared in many columns and in many speech-
es. And what is it that must not be permitted? What
must not be permitted is the result of a democratic elec-
tion in Chile. The New York Times, which has spoken
loud and often about democratic processes has, since the
elections, been talking about whether or not military
rule is the answer. The New York Times thinly veils this
line by saying maybe the medicine is worse than the dis-
ease. Maybe. And then goes on in the next editorial sug-
gesting that the military may not have a clgice in the
matter. That they may have to take power. You can be
sure the policy underneath those editorials is much more
in the direction of encouraging the military: of Chile to
take power. In this sense there is small difference be-
tween Spiro Agnew’s policy of studying the question of
calling off the 1972 elections in the U.S.A. and the New
York Times calling for a rejection of a democratic elec-
toral decision in Chile. It is fundamentally the same pol-
icy. And no matter how thinly veiled, this is the policy of
the American ruling circles.

Now, why is there such fear about this election. As
I said, they fear the new element that has emerged in
the Chilean election. And what is new in this election?
The election of a socialist president? That is.not what is
new. Socialist presidents have been elected before. Even
Left socialist presidents have been elected before. So
that is not the new element the Chilean election intro-
duces into the revolutionary developments. What is new
is the nature of the mass movement that elected Presi-
dent Salvador Allende. This-mass movement in Chile
that elected the new president is a united front move-
ment on a new level.

It is a united front movement based on changing the
relations of the class forces in Chile. It is a united front
movement for taking the steps, the necessary steps to
establish socialism in Chile. It is a united front move-
ment for a revolutionary change. And therefore the elec-
tions in Chile are a revolutionary, democratic mandate
of the people. That’s what is new! And that’s what the
ruling circles of this country fear so much. A revolution-
ary, democratic electoral mandate with the power of
the organized masses to back it up. That’s what has crea-
ted a sense of panic in the ranks of the ruling class. This
development in Chile has shed the last figleaf from bour-
geois propaganda. Can you just hear former Presidents
Kennedy, Johnson, Eisenhower and the New York Times
saying: ‘‘We will accept the verdict of the people as long
as it is democratically arrived at.”

This has been the big propaganda line that the rul-
ing circles have been putting over. They have been using

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this tactic because they know that masses in the United
States, who have not experienced revolutions, can be
misled into believing that non-electoral revolutions are
not democratic.

In this sense one could ask, was our revolution in
1776 democratic or non-democratic? But because the
masses don’t know, they have been able to say, “we will
accept any verdict as long as it is democratically arrived
at.’ But now that last figleaf has been torn off. A revo-
lutionary mandate democratically and electorally ar-
rived at — that’s what’s new in Chile.

It is for this reason that the ruling circles in Ameri-
ca are thinking about military rule — counter-revolution
from the barrel of the gun. To overthrow what was demo-
cratically, electorally arrived at in Chile. The ruling cir-
cles don’t mind political changes, as long as the capital-
ist class rule remains. They don’t mind socialist parties
— they didn’t get excited about electing a Harold Wilson
in England, or a Guiseppe Saragat in Italy, who are so-
cialist in name only, because the class rule remains in-
tact. But in Chile there is a difference. That is the man-
date is to change that class rule. That is the mandate |
that won the Chilean election. That is new. The world —
revolutionary movement has not before experienced
this road to power.

Because of this there are a number of questions,
theoretical and practical, that have emerged. Does this
mean the electoral path is now the only path to working
class power? It does not. That conclusion would not only
be wrong, it would be opportunistic, it would be a right
opportunistic conclusion. It does mean, however, that
when the elections are used as a weapon of a fighting,
militant coalition that it can win. And that is a very im-
portant conclusion. It is one of the fundamental things
we have to conclude from the Chilean experience.

Does the Chilean experience mean that this is the
only path to power for all countries? No it does not. It is
proof of nothing of the kind. Revolutionaries must be
ready for all forms of struggle. More than anything else
human experience proves that revolutionaries must be
ready for combinations of forms of struggle. The proper
ingredients of military, non-military, violent, non-violent,
at the proper time is what I think Chile indigates — prop-