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EDITORIAL

Yes, whatever hanky-panky went on behind the
scenes involving the Canadian Commercial Bank
(before it went out of business), the government, Can-
ada’s major banks, and across-the-border manipula-
tions, Ought to be brought out in full in Parliament.

And true, the approval of the sale of rancid tuna to
Canadian consumers — or any other consumers —
by the minister of fisheries rightly cost him his job.
Who knows how far he would have gone, risking the
health and lives of people to protect a few paltry
dollars for the business interests?

Having said that, we should not for a moment
forget the Wilson budget, which is the real threat to
Canada and Canadians. This blueprint for ruin is
already before Parliament and part of it has already
been tested, and defeated.

But the Tory government’s attempt to slash pen-
sions, an attempt that failed, was only a forerunner of
what is in store for all segments of the population.

The Macdonald report buttresses a number of the
anti-people parts of the budget, but it remains a
report; the budget is real, like a circling shark, waiting
to draw blood for the monopolies and their govern-
ment.

On Sept. 10, External Affairs Minister Joe Clark
announced a number of measures, augmented by
other ministries, to spruce up Canada’s presence in the
Arctic. On the face of it such moves would seem to be
the result of patriotic fervor, the Tory government’s
response to public outcry against U.S. incursion into
Canadian territorial waters.

Why then, is the heralded flag-planting suspect?
After all, the government announced a decision to
proceed with construction of a Polar Class 8 ice-
breaker, whose 194-metre length and 190,000 horse-
power engines will allow it to smash through ice 2:5
metres thick, making it the most formidable craft this
side of the North Pole. Canadians could applaud such
astep — if we could be assured that the government is
being perfectly open and above board, and thinking
only of the preservation of Canadian sovereignty.

Much the same could be said of the drawing of what
are called straight baseline boundaries enclosing the
internal waters of Canada as they relate to the land
territory; an increase in military surveillance flights
making Canada’s presence more visible; vague plans
for Canadian naval operations in the Eastern Arctic
next year; improvement in navigational aids and
communications; and legislation to extend Canadian
legal jurisdiction to this country’s offshore territories.
And add to that an Arctic island national park.

The Wilson budget battle

Through all its manoeuvring comes the clear pic-
ture of Mulroney government support for free trade
with the U.S.

Free trade means making Canada an adjunct of the
U.S. Integration is too kind and generous a term for
what is being plotted.

People in this country should not be thrown off

guard by reports of protectionist measures stacking up
in the U.S. Congress. While not all of Canada’s corpo-
ration chiefs see benefits in free trade, if the giants of
the U.S. military-industrial complex do, and Reagan is
their mouthpiece, the dice will be heavily loaded.

As well as the free trade issue, on the immediate
agenda for battle is the Wilson budget’s plan to de-
index family allowances, to squeeze more income tax
out of lower-income Canadians by similar de-indexing
and to slash transfer payments to the provinces for
education funding.

The battle against the budget calls for a powerful,
united struggle involving the entire labor movement
and all democratic forces, to conduct aggressive resist-
ance to the attacks of the Mulroney Tories on the
rights and benfits won’by the people of Canada.

Need assurances on Arctic

It is well to remember that it was the United States
icebreaker Polar Sea that barged into Canadian terri-
torial waters without asking permission and that dur-
ing its journey through the North West Passage,
sinister hints were dropped that Soviet submarines
might be under the ice.

And yet, it is the same Mulroney Tory government
that hands over the soveriegnty of Canada’s Arctic
mainland to the U.S. through the North Warning
System; colludes with it in testing the cruise missile for
a first strike against the USSR; abdicates its responsi-
bility for Canadian independence through its subser-
vient role in the North American Aerospace Defence
agreement, and is backing into Star Wars through
“indirect” participation.

No wonder the bristling claims of Joe Clark that his
Tories are out to defend Canada’s sovereignty and
independence elicit some doubts.

Perhaps the honorable minister would like to assure
the people of Canada that a Tory government would
never use all this Arctic muscle to help build the
military superiority sought by U.S. imperialism, that
this is not the reason for getting it all up there. Such use
would be against the best interests of Canadians, not
in defence of them. It would be the opposite of defend-
ing our sovereignty.

rnd >
————

wis icp WS

Profiteer of the week

How many dollars can you find in your alphabet soup? Not
many, Campbell Soup Co. Ltd., Toronto has them all salted away.
After-tax profit for year ended July 28 was $12.5-million. For the
previous year it was $10.8-million. You always knew Campbells
could dish it out. Now you see how they can take it.

“TRIBUNE

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Earlier this month, the U.S. Airforce
conducted the first test of a new generation
of space weaponry. The weapon, known

~ asa Miniature Homing Vehicle, is an anti-
satellite (ASAT) device. It was fired from a
high-flying F-15 fighter plane, and suc-
cessfully sought out and destroyed an old
American satellite in Earth orbit.

As it struck, it blasted away what may
be the last chance for an agreement to halt

:
Fred Weir

U.S. ASAT test deadly to arms control

News
Analysis

onerational ASAT system, refused to
include any limits on those weapons in the
SALT treaties.

Under this pressure, the Soviets began
to develop a similar, but non-nuclear
ASAT system, which they apparently
tested a number of times during the 1970s.
This is the “Soviet monopoly” to which
Speakes refers.

The Miniature Homing Vehicle repres-
ents a new wave of technology. It will not

L

the militarization of space.

In fact, the main target of this exercise is
not in space at all. The Reagan administra-
tion is determined to send a clear message,
before next November’s Summit meeting,
that its space weaponization program is
not up for negotiation. It has been
reported that the Pentagon was not even
ready to test the Miniature Homing Vehi-
cle this year, but consented to do so to
meet the political demands of the White
House.

For the past two years, the USSR has
been observing a unilateral moratorium
on ASAT testing, while simultaneously

pressing for negotiations to halt space mil-
itarization altogether. The Soviet morato-
rium has been widely acknowledged as an
important initiative which, if matched by
the Reagan administration, would effec-
tively smother the space arms race before
it gets underway.

The test was stark evidence that the
Reagan administration is in a hurry to get
its space militarization program going
regardless of Soviet offers or public opin-
ion. Said White House spokesman Larry
Speakes, “We have to test, and we have to
test now. The U.S. must develop its own
ASAT capability in order to deter Soviet

threats.” To agree to accept the Soviet
moratorium on testing would perpetuate
what Speakes calls the “Soviet monopoly”
on ASAT weapons.

This is even more widely inaccurate
than most Reagan administration “Soviet
threat” rhetoric. In fact it was the United
States which deployed the world’s first
functioning ASAT system more than 20
years ago. Between 1963 and 1975, the
U.S. maintained two: installations of
nuclear-tipped Nike Zeus and Thor
ASAT missiles at Kwajalein Atoll and
Johnston Island in the Pacific. During the
early 1970s, the U.S., which had the only

only be the first effective anti-satellite
weapon, but is also the leading edge of
Star Wars weaponry. The highly sophisti-
cated electronics that will be used to guide
the ASAT missile to its satellite-target can
also be refined to destroy ICBM warheads
in space.

The Soviet made it clear that if the test
of the Miniature Homing Vehicle went
ahead, they would be forced to cancel their
moratorium on testing such weapons
themselves. The ensuing competition will
be far more difficult, if not impossible to
stop.

_ 4e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, SEPTEMBER 25, 1985 ©