PALME DUTT DISCUSSES CHINA'S STAND

The test ban treaty--
small but precious gain

By R. PALME DUTT

“mehe partial test ban treaty has
become a test for the Peace
- movement of the world.

Can we succeed in carrying
forward this first ‘mited ad-
vance, this first interrupting of the
continuous extension of the arms
race at any rate in certain
spheres, this small and precious
initial gain won by the effort of
the peoples of the whole world,

- and not least by the strength,
_ political leadership and negotiat-
~ ing patience of the Soviet Union?

Can we enlarge this first hole
made in the hitherto solid wall of
limitless nuclear arms testing and
extension, until the peoples of
the whole world come flooding
through to win the final aim of
the complete banning and des-
truction of all nuclear weapons?

We can achieve this great final
aim.

But we can only achieve this
aim by united strength and
efforts of all the peace forces of
the world. ;

All the old familiar enemies of

such advance are on the warpath
to prevent it.
' Teller, the self-styled U.S.
“Father of the H-Bomb,’’ has
denounced the treaty: ‘‘Ratifica-
tion would have grave conse-
_ quences for the security of the
US. and the free world.” De
Gaulle has rejected it.

Adenauer and the Bonn- mili-
tarists have shown their fury.

Goldwater and the Right-Wing
Republicans have denounced it as
a “new Yalta,’”’ “‘surrender to
Communism,” ‘capitulation to
the Soviet Union.’’ The same
rattle is opened as after Teheran,
Yalta and Potsdam.

At this moment of trial, when
ull unity is needed for the great
dattle now opening, it is a shock.
ing thing that the government of
he second Socialist Power, the
_ chinese People’s Government,

- should even temporarily join the
thorus of denunciation.

sy

~

The Chinese spokesmen say it
Ss a surrender to American im-
derialism and capitulation to the
Jnited States.

- How has this appalling align-
nent become possible?

Let us first try to understand

the case of the Chinese Govern-
nent.
Its spokesmen have  unfor-
‘unately accompanied their case
with the most violent and reck-
ess abuse of the Soviet .Union,
yther Socialist countries and
Sommunist Parties, which does
them no credit, and does not help
their case in the eyes of serious
Communists.

The Soviet Government is de-
clared to be guilty of “‘betrayal’’
of the Soviet people, the Social.
ists and the people of the world.

It is accused of ‘‘open cap-
tiulation to U.S. imperialism’’;
“Great Power chauvinism,” and
all the rest of the usual rigmarole,
hitherto familiar only in some of
the lowest gutter organs of the
~ anti-Communists and _ anti-Soviet
press.

For those of us who were Com-
munists, striving to serve as
Communists in whatever role,
years before there was a Chinese
Communist Party, pledging sup-

_ port for the Bolshevik Revolution
-.and fighting alongside it ever

since, all these denunciations and

charges of “betrayal” by the

Soviet Union are a very old and

familiar story.
ie e

I remember my first public de-
bate with Brailsford in December
1917 when he denounced the
Soviet Government for “‘betrayal’”’
of international Socialism by sign-
ing the Brest Treaty with German
imperialism.

“Socialism in one country’”’ was
of course “‘betrayal’’ of the world
Socialist Revolution. :

The mouthers of the abstract,
ultra-revolutionary formulas were
the real defeatists.

Through all this half-century
of “‘betrayal’’, the Soviet Union
and world Socialist Revolution
and national liberation (only
made posible by the Soviet
Revolution) have sped forward at

‘a pace unparalleled in historical

development.
It is always the anti-Soviet
moaners about betrayal who

have fallen by the wayside, re-
jected by history.

What is the real Chinese case—
apart from. feckless anti-Soviet
abuse, which is below the level of
serious argument and can only be
regarded as evidence of bad tem-
per?

China and the heroic Chinese
Revolution are confronted with a
very difficult position in the
present
almost as difficult as the early
Soviet Union.

China, the most numerous
country in the world, one-quarter
of mankind, is excluded from
international councils and nego-
tiations.

It is denied its rightful place
as one of the five permanent
Powers of the United Nations,
where Chinese and Soviet repre-
sentatives could have conducted a
common struggle for common
aims.

_U.S.. imperialism refuses to
make peace with China, still
maintains an open state of war,
with vast massed military, naval
and nuclear power ranged against
the coast of China.

e

One could understand — the
concern of the Chinese Govern-
ment with nuclear weapons but
it has a Pact of Friendship,
Alliance. and Mutual Assistance
with the Soviet Union, and it
knows that the full - nuclear
strength of the Soviet Union and
its rocket capacity would be
used to defeat an American attack
on China. ,

_As Mr. Khrushchev said in his
speech to his electors’ on
February 27, 1963:

“Tf an attack is made on the
Chinese People’s Republic . . .
the Soviet Union will come to the
rescue of its friends and deliver
a crushing blow at the
aggressors.”

When Chinese leaders in place
of seriously understanding the
situation give way to feelings of
grievance and_ eventually to
moods of anti-Soviet anger this
may be humanly understandable,
though not in terms of a serious
Communist understanding.

Here, in this contradictory,
genuinely difficult international
situation can be seen the hard,
concrete kernel of the trouble.

It is this which has produced
the vast scholastic nonsense of
the grandoise ‘‘ideological’’ con-
troversy, whose empty battle of
abstract formulas could make no

international situation—_

sense to any experienced Marxist.

For Marxism is always con-
crete; deals with living, concrete
situations and practical problems,
never plays with formulas in a
vacuum. :

But if we need to understand
‘China’s problems and strengthen
our fight for the just rights of
China in the international situa-
tion, it is necessary for the
Chinese comrades, and any in-
fluenced by their argument, to
understand the historic leading
role which the Soviet Union is
today fulfilling in the cause of
the fight for peace of all man.
kind.

o

The Soviet Revolution ‘has
always led the way for half a
century. The Chinese Revolu-
tion is the child of the Soviet
Revolution. The victory of
Socialism and national liberation
have only been made possible by
the Soviet Revolution.

The strength of the Soviet
Union has stood and stands as
the strongest guardian in the
cause of the independence of the

people against imperialist aggres-

sion. Suez showed it. Cuba
showed it.

Castro, Nasser, Ben Bella and
a host of others, also the Chinese
leaders in their time, -all have
borne witness.

Today the Soviet
leading the way in its most auda-
cious task—to prevent a_ third
world war, to prevent the nuclear
arms race (and every arms race
has hitherto led to war) terminat-
ing in the destruction of a nu-
clear world war.

This aim cannot be won at a
single leap.

It will require all the united
strength and tireless campaigning
of the people and all the skill
and experienced diplomacy: of
the Soviet Union and their Social.
ist colleagues, to achieve patient
step after step.

The Chinese statement also
agrees in words that the advance

See DUTT, Pg. 12

Union is

PROF
OF THE

et nee

MONTH

yoy know the American workers’ song Paul
immortalised about Joe Hill—the
miners’ organiser killed by the copper bosses.

Robeson

“From San Diego up to Maine in every mine and mill,
“* Where working men defend their rights, it’s there you’ll find Joe

Hill

It springs right to mind when you talk to 56-year-old Harvey
Murphy—National Vice-President in Canada of the International
Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers.

As tough as the Rocky Mountains, he radiates an incorruptible
working-class strength that has inspired a generation of Canadian
miners and roused the hatred and fear of the mine bosses. ;

Delegates are not likely to forget his speech at Dundee—without
doubt the most stirring and moving fraternal address ever delivered
to our national conference and met with a standing, prolonged

ovation.

Every sentence, boomed out in a grayel voice with a nasal twang,
packed the punch of a powered hammer. ~ :

Black-listed

@ HARVEY MURPHY

Harvey Murphy’s first taste of class battle came soon after he
started work in the U.S. automobile industry as a 16-year-old

plumber in the early twenties.

During the 1928 depression, he returned to Canada and helped
organise the coal miners of the Crow’s Nest Pass in the Rockies.

These two-fisted radical miners of the West were gn strike for
eight months over the black-listing of their militants.

’ For years after, Harvey Murphy couldn’t get a job in the Canadian
mines where he had worked as a pipe-drawer. He was even black-
listed during the war when the mines were crying out for labour.
He finally found work in the shipyards.

Then he returned to Copper Mountain in British Columbia in
1942 when the miners went on strike for better conditions. He
organised the first Local of the Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers in
Copper Mountain and was appointed full-time official.

In 1955, he became International Representative of the union
which has 70,000 members in hard rock and metal mining on both
sides of the U.S.-Canadian border. :

And when autonomy of the Canadian members was established,
he was elected National Vice-President.

Big As Life

He is also President of the union’s Western District which ranges

right up into the Yukon and the s

West Territory.

parsely-populated, remote North-

Murphy is an independent-minded, proud and intensely patriotic
Canadian who has battled hard to free his union of the “big
brother” and sometimes corrupting influences from across his

country’s. border.
You know the lines:

“ And standing there as big as life, and smiling with his eyes,
“Says Joe: ‘ What they forget to kill, went on to organise’.”
That’s his testimonial—a testimonial shared by his trade union
brothers of the Wild and not so Woolly West. :

Neto Nearer Notre Norn Nnt ot Not Norte Not Noor Not

@ Recently Harvey Murphy, Canadian Vice Pres. of the
Mine Mill led a fraternal delegation from his union to the .
annual conference of the National Union of Mineworkers, —

Scottish Area. The above profile of the militant Canadian
trade union leader was carried in the August issue of the —

“Scottish Miner.”

Case for public owned railway >
system outlined in booklet

Crisis On The Railways; a book-
let by and for railroaders—and
the Canadian taxpayer. A thumb.
nail sketch of what is happening
to Canada’s rail systems and the
wage carners who keep them
running. Available at ihe Co-op
Bookstore, 341 West Pender, Van-
couver, B.C. Price 15-cents a
copy.

his little booklet sets forth the
T case for a publicly-owned rail-
way system in Canada; not as the
booklet warns, ‘‘a repetition of
the CNR form of public owner-
ship, with the weight of concern
for the stockholders’, but a
nationalized transport system
which gives public service and the
interests of its employees, top
priority.

Over the past two decades the
policies of Canada’s ‘‘privately
owned,” (new mainly U.S.), CPR
and “‘our railroad’, the CNR, can
be summed up in a few descript-
ive terms; “rationalization”,
“mechanization", ‘‘dieselization”’ ,
“automation”, ‘speed-up’, ete.,.
all indicative of a single purpose:

To reduce man-power, i.e. pay-
roll, and safeguard

stockholder

profits. And, not unimportant to

the Canadian taxpayer, to go to
the government of the day for a

subsidy handout running into
Millions of dollars to bolster
“revenues’’ and keep the rail

coupon-clippers satisfied,

The result of such policies as
far as railreaders are concerned,
is the loss of 40,000 jobs since

1952 alone, with a much smaller

staff, Gin terms of gross tonnage

haulage per man per mile) doing

almost double the work. And these
reductions in payroll staff are a
continuing process. While high-
way, air and water transport

aii

_ August 30, 1963—PACIFIC TRIBUNE-—Page
ee ee ia ee a) Seas age

have cut into rail haulage, a fact
which the railway moguls never
tire of repeating. What they omit
to mention is their corporate own- —
ership of alleged ‘competitors’: —

What lies ahead for railroad
workers? Crisis On The Railways
spells it out with specific thor
oughness. The Canadian Brother-
hood of Railway Transport and
General Workers, in line with the
general thesis of this booklet,
poses the question; an integrated
transportation system is going
to come. The question is, is it
going to come the capitalist way,
with probably the CPR taking
over, or is it going to come the
public service way, with owner-
ship vested in the Canadian pub- —
lige:

To protect the jobs of railroad
workers—and the pockets of the —
Canadian taxpayer, an hour spent
in reading and pondering over —
Crisis On The Railways will pro-
vid the answer—the only answer
—public ownership of Canada’s |
railways.

Get your
last.

copy while they

T. McK.