WORLD 35th GDR anniversary marked by optimism By FILS DELISLE Tribune Berlin Correspon- BERLIN — The people of the GDR celebrated the 35th anniversary of their socialist republic Oct. 7 on a note of optimism for their country’s continuing progress. At the same time meetings and festi- vals all over the country warned of the conspiracy against peace organized by the U.S. Reagan administration and some of Washington’s al- lies abroad. Erich Honecker, State Council Chairman and General Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party, told a large meet- ing at the People’s Palace that in three and a half decades the GDR has gone through a remarkable development. Shattered physically in the war, it had now reached a stage where its people were guaran- teed further steady progress, assured employment, ed- ucational opportunities and a good standard of living that keeps rising from year to year. The program of the GDR was social progress and work for peace. ‘ Present at the anniversary celebrations were delegations from 67 countries. The Com- munist Party of Canada was represented by Val Bjarnason, a member of the party’s Cen- tral Executive, and Gerry Van Houten, a member of its cent- ral committee. The Soviet delegation was headed by Andrei Gromyko, First Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of the USSR. Emphasizing the joint foreign policy of the socialist countries, collectively arrived at, Gromyko said the GDR was making a worthy contribution to the cause of peace. He said the U.S. and its al- lies were responsible for the steep rise in armaments. If the USA is really prepared to show an interest in solving acute cur- rent problems, Gromyko con- tinued, the Soviet Union would react positively. ““‘We are ready for an honest, ser- ious dialogue. We are ready to work with everybody who st- rives to diminish the danger of war.” The fraternity that has been a characteristic of the GDR and the USSR in their mutual relations was once again em- phasized by the signing of a pact between them, during Gromyko’s visit, covering mutual trade and other re- lations until the year 2000. The anniversary day ended with a torch procession of 300,000 young people in the streets of Berlin. The city echoed to pledges of support for the socialist GDR and its efforts for peace that were shouted by the 300,000 in a single sustained roar. Be li io, er Ap) proc esl Pegs ratte! Tae PHOTO — ADN-ZB The struggle to safeguard worl d peace was forefront at the GDR’s -S 35th anniversary Oct. 7. Photo: Berlin peace rally 1983. Honecker summed up the significance of the anniversary with the declaration that the socialist GDR was the most important achievement in the history of the German working class. ‘‘What other German state,’ he asked, ‘‘could claim for itself the things that distin- guish the German Democratic Republic? Not national arro- gance, not destructive German ~self-importance are the basis of the actions of the GDR, but creative collaboration in the family of socialist nations.” Honecker warned that ‘‘more weapons, Whether on earth or in space, do not bring more security”. The national day opened with a military parade which was viewed by hundreds of thousands of people. All signs point to U.S. intervention in Nicaragua It is growing increasingly apparent that something dramatic may be about to happen in Central America. Nicaragua’s leader, Daniel Ortega, recently charged at the U.N. that the United States is planning to invade his country, “‘perhaps as early as mid-October.’’ Cuban statements have been even more emphatic. Cuban spokesmen say that if Reagan is re-elected, he intends to wage *‘total war”’ against revolution in Central America and the Caribbean basin. Unfortunately, a number of recent developments — that there is more than a little substance to these ears. e Late last month, with barely a ripple of media com- ment, the Reagan administration laid in place its casus belli for the invasion of Nicaragua. On the television program, Meet the Press, Vice President George Bush announced that Nicaragua’s intention to acquire a mod- ern air force constitutes ‘‘a direct threat to the security of the United States’’, and that the United States *“‘cannot tolerate and will not permit’? Nicaragua to complete and put into operation the Punta Heute airfield with its ‘10,000 foot runway”’ designed to accommodate jet fighter aircraft. ~ If all this has a depressingly familiar ring to it, it is because a similar propaganda pretext was used to justify the U.S. invasion of Grenada one year ago. Nicaragua, which has had no air force to speak of, has suffered for more than two years from contra bombing and helicopter gunship attacks, as well as regular — and arrogant — U.S. violations of its airspace. Now, fed-up, the Sandinistas are taking steps to end all that. Typically, the reaction of the Pentagon, and profes- sional media alarmists, has been shrill. They claim that Nicaragua is about to receive ‘‘front-line Soviet fighters’ to be flown by ‘‘Bulgarian-trained pilots’. This, they say, will give Nicaragua ‘‘regional superior- ity’’ and ‘“‘threaten the security of the Western Hemi- sphere.” The facts hardly warrant this. Nicaragua has said that it will receive two squadrons of MiG 17’s and possibly one further squadron of MiG 21’s. The MiG 17 was the USSR’s front-line fighter plane of the early 1950's; the MiG 21 was phased out of service with the Soviet Air Force during the late 1960’s. These aircraft will be useful in defending the integrity of Nicaraguan airspace, but itis impossible to see them as a threat to the region, much less the United States. The most powerful airforce in Central America remains that of Honduras, greatly beefed-up in recent years by massive deliveries of mod- ern American equipment. e The diplomatic crisis in Central America has come to a head, and there is now every evidence that the United States is ready to abandon even the pretence of 10 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, OCTOBER 17, 1984 PHOTO — BARRICADA negotiated settlement, and:go over to military action. Late last month, Nicaragua announced its acceptance ‘in totality and without modification’’ of the draft reg- ional nonaggression treaty prepared for Central America by the four nations of the Contadora group. Almost immediately, the Reagan administration — which has paid lip-service to the Contadora peace pro- cess — began to undercut it. Spokesmen for the admin- istration declared that Sandinista behaviour was “‘very, very tricky’, and dismissed the Contadora treaty as “full of loopholes’’. More ominously, U.S. client states, El Salvador and Honduras, have also begun to back-off from the Con- tadora peace process at the very moment when it prom- ises to achieve success. All of this suggests that what- ever ‘“‘solutions’’ the U.S. has in mind for Central © America, they do not at this point involve negotiations or peace treaties. As one Sandinista official aptly remarked, “*It seems as though, short of committing collective suicide, there is nothing Nicaragua can do to please the U.S.” e Nicaragua’s national elections, announced last February and scheduled for November 4, have come “There are less than 40,000 followers of the Nicaraguary Democratic Coordinating Committee, the right wing sec- tors which Washington claims constitute the only ‘valid’ opposition to the FSNL,” comments the Sandinista news- . paper Barricada. “This barely approaches the Committee _of Mothers of Heroes and Martyrs in size. This committee represents mothers of more than 57,000 Nicaraguans kill- ed by Somocistas both before and after the Revolution’s triumph in 1979.” Photo: Mothers holding up pictures of martyred family members. News Analysis Fred Weir under increasing attack from the Reagan administratio and its think-alikes among Nicaragua’s right-wing position parties. The U.S. is demanding that the ele tions be postponed until next January because the oppa ition has had ‘‘insufficient time to prepare’’ and becaus ‘‘violations of human rights’’ in Nicaragua have made fair elections impossible. . One is forced to recall that this is the same Reagg administration which last spring sang paeons of p for the electoral sham in its own client state of El vador. Only right-wing parties took part in that electia because during the past four years military death squ have systematically exterminated all left-of-center 9) position: by conservative estimates, some 30,000 tra unionists, peasant leaders, and left-wing cadres ha\ been slaughtered. Those who survived are those who took to the hills and joined the guerrillas. q In Nicaragua, by contrast, a full political spect from left to right, is freely participating in the electi This despite the fact that there is a war on, and the country is under economic blockade. The Sandinistas have even permitted Arturo Cruz — a man who has worked openly with the contras — to return from his ‘exile’ in the U.S. to lead the right-wing opposition. As for “‘human rights violations’’ in Nicaragua, recent incident has ‘‘deeply disturbed’’ the U.S. State Department. It happened three weeks ago in the Nicara- guan town of Boaco, where Arturo Cruz was holding # rally with some 100 of his supporters. Suddenly, Cruz claims, a Sandinista ‘‘mob’’ appeared and brutally at tacked his car, which was parked on a nearby street, throwing a stone through its windshield. Later, Ci posed for TIME magazine and wondered in aggrie tones that were echoed by the Reagan administra ‘*How can we go into an electoral process if this is § to happen every day?”’ Sandinista spokesmen have proposed a much credible explanation for the U.S. desire to see Nicara gua’s election postponed. By holding the electio Nov. 4, just two days before the U.S. presidential tion, the Sandinistas have put Reagan in a difficult if he invades Nicaragua before the elections, he will] to face electoral consequences at home. If he wai after, he will stand condemned by the world fo throwing a democratically-elected government. - Thus Reagan wants the Sandinistas to solve his pull relations dilemma for him — by postponing their € tion! a The handwriting is upon the wall, and it says t Nicaraguan and Cuban charges that the U.S. is prepa for open intervention in Central America are W founded. Only a mass mobilization of world opinion, this point, can prevent it. ; q