North-West. > ‘The dawn comes up like thunder’ ~ in Burma revolt The people of Burma, under the leadership of the Com- munist Party, led by Than Tun, have risen in revolt. Armed guerrillas are fighting in the rich fields of Central Burma and the hills of Arakan and the The government has moved its entire military resources against them -under the guidance of the British Military Mission. But this has actually led to an increase in the strdngth of the guerrilla move- ment, which is spreading: to other districts and is finding active sup- Port all over Burma, including its capital, Rangoon, . The guerrillas have liberated Some” districts where they have established a people’s administra- tion. Unable to stem the tide of the Mass movement the government has circulated the usual slander about “bandits and terrorists.” The present upsurge is a con- tinuation of the 1946 movement which culminated in the end of direct Britis rule. At the head of the 1946 move- Ment were representatives of the Burmese capitalist class who, like their counterparts in India, be- trayed the) people and accepted a limited “freedom.” The real face of this freedom was exposed when the Anglo-Burmeseé Treaty was published, two import- ant clauses of ‘which were: e@ Burma could not national- ize any British concern without full compensation (which she can hever pay because of her pov- erty). e@ Burma would accept “ad- vice” from the British Defence Mission and allow British forces to uso the aerodromes and sea- Ports. \ Thus thea economic stranglehold of Britain, in three main monopoly concerns, the Burma Oil Company, the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company and the Bombay-Burma Trading Corporation, remained intact. In fact the Burma Oil Company trebled its profits in 1947. It was against this phoney free- dom, the miserable conditions, and the betrayal by the capitalists that thd mass upsurge began in March last with the strike of 25,000 work- ers in four British concerns. The Rangoon government replied with military terror, mass arrests and suppression of the trade union Movement, the Communist Party and all other democratic organiza~ tions. sid Se But the unrest spread to the rail- Waymen, the peasants in Central Burma, and the government’s own employees, The Communist Party has been leading these struggles Which have developed into armed battles, Simultaneously, ‘disillusionment spread to Premier Thakin Nu’s‘own ‘Betrayal ’ Progressive party presidemtial c4andidate Henry Wallace (1) is congratulated by president Albert Fitzgerald of the United Electrical Radio and Machine ‘Workers (CIO) following his Labor Day address to the U-E convention in New York, Wallace declared President Truman’s enforcement of the Taft-Hartley law a “betrayal” of iabor. ‘ ‘ Vatican calls for new italian labor setup ROME—-The Vatican, through its Civic National Com- mittee, has laynched an open campaign for a new union to rival the six million-strong of Labor (CGIL.). The campaign was actually start- ed weeks ago ‘when Christian Democratic union leaders began discussing secession from the es- tablished labor body. The Vatican openly entered the discussion after the CGIL issued an appeal to young members of Catholic Action to support and join with organized labor. The Civic National Committee responded by plastering Rome with posters calling on Catholic Action members to reject the ap- peal, arguing it is sponsored by Communists and adding: “Italy ‘land her young workers want a federation that will defend their sacred rights and be free from political influence.” The Civic National Committee, a lay organization supervised by the Vatican, was organized during the election campaign last February. It was credited with a substantial role in bringing about a Christian Democratic victory at the polls. It is generally expected that the forthcoming meeting of the Asso- ciatidn of Catholic Workers will take steps to launch a rival labor body. This view is bolstered by the two latest speeches of Pope Pius XII, who urged just such action. Italian General Confederation U.S. denies visa to Toledano MEXICO CITY — President Vicente Lombardo ‘Toledano of the Latin American Federa- tion of Labor (CTAL) has been barred from entering the U.S. The labor leader was advised by the American Embassy here that he would not be granted a U.S. visa. Lombardo sought to enter the U.S. when he was invited to ad- dress a meeting of American work- ers in California Sept. 19. American spokesmen said he was barred under its policy of excluding “Com- munists and other undesirable persons.” Lombardo has frequently been critical of the activities of Ameri- can corporations and the support they have received from the U.S. government in seeking to i hold down the living standards of Latin American workers. US authorities to free female sadist FRANKFORT, Germany — Ilse Koch, the Nazi woman monster who made lampshades out of the skins of murdered tattooed prison- ers at Buchenwald. concentration camp in World War II, will be freed next year, U.S. occupation authorities have ruled. The decision, which has been approved by American military governor Gen, Lucius D. Clay, cur- tails Ilse Koch’s imprisonment from life to four years, of which she has already served three, The woman sadist was originally sentenced to be hanged by a U.S. court. The first commutation of her sentence, to life imprisonment, came after she somehow managed to become. pregnant, in spite of guards and walls, in Landesberg prison. party ranks, especially the People’s Volunteer Organization (P.V.O.). Unnerved by this, Thakin Nu tried a little shadow-boxing by de- claring that Burma will go Social- ist. : But this trick has failed, The Burmese revolutionary upsurge is sweeping forward as part of the postwar upsurge in India and South-East Asia, Clubs in lieu of wages PARIS—More than 100 French workers were injured September 15 when police launched a night stick attack against a demonstration of aircraft strikers who had rallied efore company offices in Paris. to demand wage increases and protest so-called economy fir- Ings, ‘ The police attack resulted in one of the most bitter street fights Since France’s liberation. ; About 100,000 workers are cur- rently striking throughout the Country and many more are ex- Pected to swell picketlines to back Up the demand of the French Gen- ral Confederationd of Labor (CGT) for a 33 percent wage hike. The Strikes cross all political lines in the French labor movement, with Many workers belonging to the tight-wing Force Ouvriere and the Christian labor federation also in- Volved, : : One of the biggest strikes is im Progress at the nationalized Ren- ault auto plant where large-scale’ layoffs have been taking place. Miners and transport workers have also walked out in several areas. ‘support, While announcing the price in- creases, France's new Premier, Henri Queuille, stated flatly at a press conference that there’ would be no higher wages for the work- ens and that his government would try to cut its expenditures chiefly by firing civil service workers. Although Socialists are partici- pating in the Queuille government and giving it their party’s formal the Socialist-led Force Ouvriere labor federation showed its discontent with Queuille’s pol- icies by echoing CGT demands for wage increases and _ strong price controls. . : Meanwhile, France's would-be dictator, Gen. Charles de Gaulle, continued stumping the country to advocate his program for wiping. out trade, unions and replacing them with “associations” linking employers and employees. Marshall Plan gives ‘Bizonia’ top priority --b) By ISRAEL EPSTEIN ocks Europe recovery The Marshall Plan for Europe has been running into serious trouble. The 17 coun- tries slated for aid, which were supposed to agree on its allocation and use through their joint Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC) have consistently squabbled instead of cooperated. one of these “countries” which is. not a country at all—the combined U.S.-British occupation zone of Germany known by the zoological- sounding name of Bizonia. © Bizonia, or in other words west- ern Germany, has both no voice in the OEEC and the strongest voice of all. This sounds like nonsense but is actually a fact. Since Ger- many is still an enemy nation, no peace treaty having bean signed, no German votes in the OEEC de- liberations. Speaking for Bizonia are American officers representing Gen. Lucius D. Clay who commands the U.S. occupation, the same man who now seems to have it in his power to decide for peace or war ‘at Berlin, Thus it comes about that west German claims are made with authority that brooks little opposi- tion. : : The same gimmick injects a U.S. representative djrectly into inter-European planning for the internal use of Marshall plan funds, despite Secretary of State Mar shall’s repeated assurances that the west Europeans would be al- lowed to work out these things for themselves. Moreover, the American representative in these supposedly purely civilian discus- sions’ does not speak for U.S. civil government. He speaks primarily for the U.S. armed forces and Brass Hat strategy for World War III. What worries former U.S. allies in western Europe about this ar- rangement, apart from the in- fringement of former promises, is that — within Europe —these of- ficers plump for rebuilding Ger- many. The Marshall plan, which was supposed to help nations in- vaded by Nazi Germany get back on their feet, now assumes quite a different shape. Eastern neighbors whom Germany devastated, such as Czechoslovakia, Poland and the USSR, of course get no aid at all. And the Germans are getting pri- ority over their western victims. This principle was established by a decision to which all 16 non-Ger- man Marshall plan countries, under The chief bone of contention has been the amount of assistance to double-barreled U.S. pressure, were finally forced to agree to on Sep- tember 11. It was supposed to re- present a compromise between US. claims for Germany and the claims of non-German countries, U.S. Marshall plan Administrator Paul G. Hoffman made the final “im- partial award.” The nature of the pressure can be seen from the declaration of one of Clay’s officers, supposedly a German representative in OEEC. He said that “if Bizonia gid not get what it wanted, the U.S. Congress could not be ex-. pected to continue appropriating funds for European recovery” (New York Times, Sept. 12, 1948). The content of the “compromise” between Clay and Hoffman, which Europeans. had no choice but to approve, was : that Germany will get a direct Marshall plan dollar grant of $414 million for 1948-49, apart from other forms of aid. In return, she must ship $10 million worth of goods 3 is to the remain- Israel Epstein ing Marshall plan nations, That is a profit of $404 million ‘for west Germany, a direct subsidy to reconstruction totally unmortgaged by any obliga- tion on the part of Germany to repair the damage she did in World War II. Who is getting preference? The Germans or their victims? Even the New York Times, a great Marshall plan defender, was so shocked by. these proce- dures that it asked on Sept. 12: “Will the U.S. which on the one hand lectures to Europeans on cooperation, be a continua] ob- struction to cooperation through its German administration? Is the European Recovery Program or the special problem of western Germany the primary considera- tion of American policy . .. It ee nn ti ent difficulties are leading up to : a major crisis .. .” oe In other words, both the hapless Marshall plan countries of Europe > and observant conservative Ameri- cans have come to the conclusion that the plan has turned into-some- thing quite different from the pro- duct originally advertised. Instead of aid to Europe, as a whole, it makes Europe into a base for re- built Germany. Instead of being non-political, it is plainly strategic. Instead of being help to Europeans to help themselves, it is a form of dictation. Yet to listen to bipartisan elec- tion speeches in this country, the scheme is still a giant piece of philanthropy, a matter of the heart which only the heartless and gub- versive can criticize at all, a lofty ‘l}undertaking on which no two men of goodwill can possibly disagree. WETU terror in Greece PARIS (ALN)—The World Fed- eration of Trade Unions has sent a new protest to the Greek gov- ernment against the “unjust” trials of union officials, among them Demetrios Paparigas, elected head of Greece’s labor federation. -Paparigas was forcibly removed from his post by the government and replaced by an appointed union official. All other elected leaders of the Greek labor federation and of major Greek unions were simi- larly deposed. These leaders are now being tried by military courts on trumped-up charges, all based on their opposition to the dictator- ial methods of the royalist regime. The WFTU issued a call to all its affiliates to send similar protests against the military trials, UML protests PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPTEMBER 24, 1948—PAGE 3