IORTH ATLANTIC TREATY By PHYLLIS CLARKE uter the Treaty has been in © for twenty years, any y May cease to be a party year, after its notice of de- lation has been given to the ernment of the United. S of America, which will in- h the Governments of the 1 parties of the deposit of ™ Notice of denunciation . . . } —Article 13, North Atlantic Treaty fe year for “denunciation” | come. A review is in pro- SS by the Trudeau. govern- At of Canada’s foreign policy. twenty years the cold war E. about the North Atlantic aty Organization has been petuated. Pressure for with- al has steadily mounted, but _Who continue to support aims of the cold war—des- pction of the Soviet Union and J Camp of socialism — advo- More By A. NIKANOROV d man Mars is clanking his Our with delight. There is no S$ more pleasant for him, the of war, than that coming the Atlantic capitals. The ; am of this news has become cularly big after the ses- a of the NATO Council held PTussels in November 1968. on convening it a month ear- than Planned, the U.S. lead- of that aggressive bloc de- 4 ee put on their allies an Agourien of military spend- » All means were resorted. to, intimidation to arms twist- Belgium, for instance, which hee to reduce its troops é 4 BRS y ‘was threatened _ iscontinuation of the ar jmeocns into its econ- @ result the Belgian Y peroane not only gave ipthe p srenuction plan but even Et a to modernise its divi- Re loned on the banks of ine. Other European coun- S, pander of the NATO, ex- ae fee Which withdrew. iad loc S military setup, Rea and which has no army, Military an increase of their om 2.5 t don an 1 Zeal, nmark © 15 percent. Bonn, d Rome showed spe- Smaller countries, like , also increased their le Spending, to say noth- Fee mene Greece where the cece arms is needed for ae €ning the regime of the: : yes either. In a nning ful] ae Sgt ad ; © needs all this? The peo- es Western Europe? No. In “au 20-year history of the ae existence they got con- ON more than one occa- in of the adventurous nature al headquarters. The peo- e to pa een Europe were es Y tor the unrestrained ce and were threatened = ny HON-existent “Soviet en the trend for the budgets to the sum of the policy worked out in the Of the international | cate our continued membership. Will Canada continue to allow the cold war delusions to deter- mine her foreign policy? Or will we finally free ourselves from the entanglement of what twenty years ago was called the “Sui- cide Pact,” to play a'role for peace in the councils of the world? What was the world into which NATO was born? Professor D. F. Fleming, whose History of the Cold War and its Origins remains the most com- prehensive study in the West, said that only two weeks after President Harry S, Truman suc- ceeded Roosevelt, he was ready to begin the cold war against the Soviet Union. “The years of labor,” he says, “by Roosevelt and Hull to build a basis of understanding with the Soviet leaders which would last through the peace making were cancelled profit irom NATO arms tension began to gain ground, it gave many people in Europe a hope for a lasting peace on our continent. But such a turn of events did not suit the Atlantic “hawks.” Having snatched at the events in Czechoslovakia, they decided to fall back into their old ways. An escalation of the military spending followed. Such a decision gladdened not only the mythical Mars. The real death merchants, the arms man- ufacturers, are Yubbing their hands with delight. The Amer- ican trusts naturally get a lion’s share of the profits. The West European countries pay the United States a thousand million dollars a year for its arms de- liveries. Lockheed alone sold 1.5 thousand million dollars’ worth of the Starfighter jet fighter planes. The Macdonnel firm made almost the same profit on the F-4 Phantom bombers. The West European monopolies — the Krupp .concern (E.R.G.), Vickers (Britain), Dasso (France), FIAT (Italy), etc.—keep pace with their American partners. The so- called Atiantic Commission func- tioning in the Netherlands and | financed by the arms manufac- turing monopolies, has stepped up its activities of late. It has directly to do with the increase of the Netherlands’ military spending by an appalling sum of 225 million guldens. Character- istically, the Commission is also ‘engaged in military propaganda —it has received an access even to the country’s schools where it spreads materials sowing -military psychosis. The NATO leaders and the’ arms merchants are carrying on a dangerous game with the des- tinies of West European peo- ples. European security can be achieved not through the escala- tion of military expenditures and brinksmanship but through seeking the opportunities of a detente and the establishment of a mutually advantageous cooper- ation between East and West. Ups eke Sayan ibs yissE out on April 23, 1945.” This was the day on which, Truman met with Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov on the eve of the estab- lishment of the United Nations. Five months later, according to Fleming, Truman “decided fin- ally to regard the Soviet Union as an unfriendly state... and began. composing the Truman Doctrine for the ‘containment’ of the Soviet Union.” By December of 1945 Senator Eastland was telling the Ameri- can people that ‘“‘Russia,is a pre- — datory, aggressor nation, and... today she follows the same fateful road of conquest and ag- gression with which Adolph Hitler set the world on fire.” In March of the next year at Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill, life-long foe of social- ism, with President Truman at his side, declared that what was needed was a great preponder- ance of power against the Soviet Union, the basis to be the alliance of . English-speaking peoples. “This means,” he said, ‘“‘a spe- cial relationship between the British Commonwealth and Em- pire and the United ‘States. . . It should carry with it the continu- ance of the present facilities for mutual security by the joint use of all naval and air-force bases in the possession of either coun- try all over the'world...”. Throughout the next year the leaders of the cold war line in Washington. London and Otta- wa preached the need of “con- tainment” of the country with whom they had just in alliance fought a war. In March of 1947 the Truman Doctrine was pro- claimed in the sending of money to Greece to prevent her people from determining their own fu- ture. “The United States,’ com- ments Fleming on Truman’s pro- nouncement, “would become the world’s anti-Communist, Russian policeman.” From there to the Marshall Plan, to prevent any progressive government emerging in West- ern Europé was but a short step. And then on to the concept of an alliance of the countries of Western Europe, the United States and Canada enunciated by Canada’s St. Laurent among others, which could include .Greece, Turkey, etc. as part of the aggression against the Soviet Union. anti- ~ By 1949 the project was well. underway and Canada’s parlia- ment which met January 26 had before it the NATO alliance, As parliament met, Tim Buck, the Communists’ leader, said of the proposal: “This is the military extension of the Marshall Plan which is U.S. imperialism’s method of putting the western world into the clutches of Wall Street. The new pact is to follow up the dol- lar with guns. “It is a military alliance not of a defensive, but of an offensive nature — offensive against the people of Western Europe, against the Soviet Union and the “New Democracies, and against the colonial peoples who are winning freedom in Asia and Africa, and whom Truman and St. Laurent hate and fear. “Under cover of high-flown rubbish about ‘defending our security,” “superiority in arms” and the “uselessness of the U.N.”, Canadians are being ask- ed to surrender their sovereign- ty over the security of our coun- try, as they have been asked to surrender control over their’ eco- nomic affairs, to the U.S. military and its high-finance masters, the Wall Street barons.” “It’s two aims,” he continued, was to “build up the military es- tablishments of Western Europe, on the basis of the U.S. control- led Ruhr, with standardized U.S. equipment, controlled by U.S. military missions” and to pro- vide legal camouflage for estab- lishing U.S, military, air and naval bases throughout the Western hemisphere and in Western Europe.” ‘No other Canadian political party opposed the alliance. Al- though individuals and even some organizations of the CCF came out against NATO, the fe- deral leader, M. J. Coldwell led his party in unity with the Con- servatives and Liberals to en- dorse the Pact. f “Mark well the day! Monday, March 28, 1949 — the tragic day when Canada’s House of Com- _mons voted 149 to 2 for the At- lantic War Pact,” says an article in the Tribune. . It continued, “The fuller im- plications of the dangerous war pact will be more revealed even to the most backward as the . hours and days pass.” Already in 1949 expenditures 969-year for denunciation for war had totalled 70 percent more than the previous year — from $60 million to-$148 million —and in the last twenty years the bill to Canadians for mem- bership in the Treaty has meant billions and billions of dollars worth of unbuilt homes, unbuilt schools’ and hospitals, lack of medical care and denial of other benefits which could have been enjoyed. Even the revelation of a secret clause of the Treaty which would | mean the sending of troops to participate in armed interven- tion in case of democratic revo- lutions within pact-signing, na- tions did not deter Canadian or other ratifiers, And on April 4, 1949 in Washington representa- tives of 12 countries met to sign the master copy of the Treaty which was placed on file in the American capital. On the eve of this event, the Associated Press dispatch point- ed out the real character of the event in saying, “The grand al- liance of the non-Communist western world. . . will be sign- ed here tomorrow by 12 coun- tries intent upon pooling their — resources against Russia.” And the Soviet Union, against ‘whose “aggression” this Treaty was touted, what were they doing? Fleming says, “Instead of launching her armies Russia was making tremendous investments in long range projects, huge fac- tories, big dams, irrigation, re- forestation and the rebuilding of cities'— all of it pure waste if the Soviets believed war inevi- table in the near future.” And just as in 1949 the cry was ‘we need NATO” to protect us against the Soviet Union,. with no foundation in fact, so again today as the peace forces . demand the implementation of section 13 for denunciation, the cry is about Soviet aggression, again with no foundation. Again the Communists’ are campaigning for Canada’s with- drawal from NATO. How will the peace forces act this time? They are stronger because of their experience in the fight against nuclear armaments, against Canada’s complicity in the U.S. aggressive war against — Vietnam, surer that the cry of Soviet threat is part of the cold war falsities. Will the decisively act to take Canada out of NATO? Ottawa, Ont. Dear Mr. Sharp: inform the Canadian government. of th ign for NATO pull-out Hon: Mitchell Sharp, M.P. Minister of External Affairs, House of Commons, | welcome your invitation to the citizens of Canada to express their opinions on the government's review of foreign policy. 1 would strongly urge that this review lead to a decision by Canada to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. ADDRESS 19bo nA ink nb Got, Saul aie ce (This card is published by the COMMUNIST PARTY OF CANADA as a service to those wishing to eir opposition to continued membership in NATO.) <> reer ahs itt © CBACIFIC TRIBUNE—JANUARY 10; 1969—Page7