: By RAE MURPHY
ig only took a few dove-like
coos from External Affairs
Minister Martin before To-
Tonto Telegram columnist Lubor
J. Zink had a bird. In a series of
i} flaming columns he spoke
| About Russian trojan horses, the
Coming Russian conquest with-

ae War and the imminent Rus-
‘an seduction of our minister

povernment, Charles DeGaulle
Nd the entire West—with the

Notable exception of The Tele-
gram.

In what has to be the wildest
terary analogy of the decade,
'NK compared the Canadian
Sovernment’s attitude to some
pean trawlers: off the Atlan-
'¢' Coast with its attitude to
ee Munsinger. He charged
: e Canadian government with
©nsorship because it does not
_ Make public charges against the

‘USSians for infiltrating. Cana-

dian fish, presumably with red
€trings, :

pou Sees a diabolical plot to

Aca Canada’s foreign policy
°m One of virtue-and mother-
°od ‘to sin and birth control.

Meee ‘all this lather-is because

vie Sean Made-a ‘trip ‘to’ the Soviet
nion, Sates

lj

i i
=

4

(YER ‘200 persons were in
attendance last weekend

ti When a Conference on Con-

hentalism —_vs, Nationalism,
Sponsored by the Woodsworth
: 5 dation took place in Toron-

4 Speakers at the plenary ses-
‘Ons included political econo-
‘Sts and politicians. At five
Panels trade unionists, econo-
Mists, writers and others led off.

woven you match academic
q affling with political fuzziness
sau are bound to get a some-
thie, unappealing mixture. That
ne Was the case, at least to a
mriber of those present, could
oe Seen in the enthusiastic res-
t Nse to a questioner towards
wi €nd of the second session
,.°. complained about the great

e i :
MPhasis only on the economic
‘tuation,

ae Andrew Rotstein, the
" et man (the second speaker
5 1S session never, appeared
1S Was a one-man act), sug-
Rested that there has been a_
thewred years of dithering on’
‘ _ 'Ssue of continentalism and
ationalism, He said we have
ae Unable to come down de-
tig cy either for our own na-
_ Onalism or for that of an Ame-

Of external ‘affairs, our whole ~

PAUL MARTIN

It is difficult to tell what the
full significance of Martin’s trip

to the USSR will be, but two -

things are clear: such visits can
do no harm, and this particular
one has already resulted in some
positive steps in the relations
between the two countries.

It would appear that Martin’s

‘discussion with the Soviet lead-

ers on Vietnam made no pro-
gress because Martin has not
budged from his government’s
untenable position that a peace
conference can be set up on

' Vietnam ‘while that country is

being murderously hombed by
the Americans.

If Martin will have been in-
fluenced by his discussions in
Moscow to move away from
this position to one of demand-
ing that United States cease its
bombing of North Vietnam, the
cause of peace will have been
served by his visit. :

Editorializing on Martin’s
visit, the Globe and Mail wrote:

“But despite the lack of any
positive Soviet response, Mr.
Martin’s trip can hardly be writ-
ten off as a failure. He now has
a good reason—and a clear duty
—to add his voice to those of

- other world statesmen who are:

urging Washington to reconsider
its refusal to end the bombings.

“Mr. Martin may feel that an

‘official Canadian condemnation

of the raids might imperil our
usefulness as potential peace-
makers. If so, he should at least
tell Washington in private what
Canadian peace envoy Chester
Ronning has been stating pub-
licly—that the bombings are the
main obstacle to peace, and must
be halted.”

Vietnam is reported to have
figured strongly also in Martin’s

discussion with Polish leaders as |

well as in his interviews with the

Pope. Lubor Zink concludes that
Martin’s quest is really for a
Nobel peace prize.

When it comes right down to
it Martin’s cynicism and delu-
sions of grandeur can probably
match anybody’s in the world,
He may well be angling for the
prize. But the fact. remains that,
whatever his motives and even if
peace is only incidental in his
thinking -and ambitions, who
would begrudge him his honor if
he were to be influential in

helping to bring the war to a-

conclusion?

Because Zink is a charter
member of the “nutty club” of
Canadian politics, many people

‘are inclined not to take him

seriously, yet, in one way or
another he reflects an influential
body in Canada and the United
States who oppose any type of
rapprochement between Canada
ahd the USSR. More and more
this body of opinion runs into
conflict with the aspirations of
the Canadian people and the true
interests of our country.

An interesting .by-product to
Martin’s visit and Zink’s out-
burst has been a discussion in
the letters to the editor page
of the Telegram.

For example, Michael J. Fen-
wick, of the United Steelwork-

CONTINENTALISM vs. NATIONALISM

rican variety.

To Rotstein, as to so many
others, nationalism is a dirty
word, and so he elaborated a
long, ingenious route to come
down, if not decisively at least
tentatively, on the side of a new
kind of nationalism.

This “nationalism” for which
he pleaded was to be in a posi-
tion to ensure all controls neces-
sary for the continuity of life
in the new technological era.

Hon. Walter Gordon, M.P.,
who has not been daunted by
the Liberal Party's recent
policy conference and again pre-
sented his views for a change in
Canadian policy. He took the
opportunity to denounce the con-
cept of North American free
trade which he said would be
disastrous for Canada. -

It was with a great deal of
satisfaction that Gordon added
that he had noticed as he travel-
led across the country that the
younger people were more keen
on keeping Canada free and in-
dependent.

The final speaker in the morn-
ing was Kenneth Bryden, M.P.P.,
the financial critic for the New
Democratic Party in the Ontario
Legislature.

Bryden firmly stated: “I am
neither a nationalist nor a conti-

nentalist. I think both concepts

are obsolete in the electronic-
nuclear age.”

What he does think is best ex-

plained by the following remark: —

“Our real problem is to bring
the mushroeming power of inter-
national corporations under con-
trol and, in -doing so, to direct
our acknowledged productive ca-
pacity to real, rather than syn-
thetic human needs. Our choice
is between what Paul Goodman
recently called the ‘mindlessness
of the empty society’ and a pos-
sible escape into sanity. The lat-
ter alternative, if we should
choose it, will not be easy, but
I think we could give it a try.”

“Then came the seminars, or
“paths to explore,” as the ad-
vance notice described them.

The one on trade unions
meandered around the subject
of which is better, an interna-
tional union or a national union,
with representatives of the big-
gest in each case in Canada
starting off, Stanley Little, of
the Canadian Union.of Public
Employees, and Eamon Park, of
the Steelworkers.

The discussion had been titled,
“Trade Unions in a Continental
Economy” ‘so it is probably not
surprising that the tenor of the
seminar was one of acceptance
of that position.

“Efficiency,” said Park is the

hallmark of a good union, and ©

no one disagreed, although a few
workers, particularly of the Ford
local in Oakville did wonder if
what was good for the United
Auto Workers in Detroit was al-
ways good for them.

It was an Ontario Hydro eco-
nomist, Larratt Higgins, who
spoke in the seminar on ‘Re-
source Development: Coopera-
tion or Integration” who opted
the most decisively for Canadian
nationalism.

Higgins said that the conti-
nental approach to North Ameri-
can water resources is in the
ancient tradition of imperialism.

As a private citizen Higgins
had done all he could to oppose
the Columbia River Treaty. He
said of it and the other schemes
proposed by backers of the con-
tinental approach to water re-
sources that they are ‘a denial
of the possibility of Canadian
development to the limit of Can-

November 25,

Mr. Martin's mission to Moscow
sends our war hawks into a tizzy

ers, in a letter to the editor asks
this question:

“Why is your political column-

ist Lubor J. Zink, red-baiting
External Affairs Minister Paul
Martin for his friendly overtures
to the Soviet Union? Whose axe
is he grinding? ...
. “What’s wrong with being
friendly with our Soviet neigh-
bor? Or is Mr. Zink still beating
his cold-war tom-toms?

“The Soviet Union is one of
our best customers. Our western
farmers can attest to that wel-
come fact. For our own good,

‘Canadians should encourage and
aid our government in establish-
ing the needed new rapproche-
ment.”

Fenwick was answered by a
letter from Jack Hladun, an ad-
mirer of Lubor Zink, thusly:

“External Affairs Minister
Paul Martin has taken it ypon
himself to forgive the Russian
Communists for their atrocities
and now visits the lion’s den.
One writer asks what is wrong
with being friendly with the
Soviet Union. The only answer
is that one must first know them
as Mr. Zink does.”

There is another answer, Jack,
that is that more Canadians
would rather know the Russians:
than Lubor J. Zink.

the dithering continue?

adian resources.”

Instead, he added, “they are a
means of allowing the ‘United
States to develop beyond the
limit of its resources on the
basis of those belonging to an-
other country.”

This seminar began to dispel
some myths that surround the
topic, such as the need for more
foreign investment, since the
-main investment is now out of
the money being earned in Can-
ada. It also began to get at the
question of whether the real in-
come of Canadians is necessarily
going to fall if we reduce the
amount of United States control
over our economy.

z Unfortunately there was no

feed back from the seminars to
another plenary session. Instead
the participants wended their
way to a banquet addressed by
Claude Ryan, editor of Le De-
Voir. :

One was left with the feeling
that while the ‘sponsors of this
gathering had all the best in--
tentions, they did not succeed
in reducing the dithering which
still goes on as.Canada-nears —
the beginning of its second. cen-
tury. .

1966—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 3