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Reality of history

It is difficult to write about
The Retreats in Spain after 30
years. The opportunity to keep
the courageous struggle of the
‘Republican forces alive has been
hampered by the efforts of the

powers-that-be to kill the whole
story through silence. But the
history of the struggles of the
people for the better life keeps
bubbling up to the surface.

The Retreats is the name giv-
en the few days when the fas-
cist armies cut Spain in half, be-
tween Valencia and Barcelona.
The Retreats tested the moral
and spiritual qualities of the In-
ternational Brigades, when cour-
age and ideals met the challenge
of history, just as they do in
Indochina today.

Hundreds of incidents crowd
one’s mind — the British com-
‘rade who went into an attack
with his only weapon a rock
tied in a piece of cloth—the com-
rades, never seen again, who
volunteered to stay behind to
cover our retreat or to recon-
noiter enemy territory—and the
comrades who were tired of re-
treat and “broke discipline” to
make a stand of their own.

It was fight and run for days
on end, constantly being pushed
through an enemy funnel, in
which your days and nights con-
sisted of bombs, shells, bullets,
shrapnel, blood, hunger, thirst
and exhaustion. Very few who
went through it could disting-
uish between living reality
and nightmares by the end of it.
And not one remained un-
changed by it.

I remember Danny, a short,
stocky worker from the States,
who revolted at the idea that we
could be beaten by fascists. “I
ain’t gonna run anymore,” he
flatly stated one day, with the
sun high overhead. We gave
him some cigarettes, and an

hour or two later we heard the
gun fire from his last desperate
fight with fascism.

A group of half-a-dozen of us
ended up at dusk on a road that
dipped between two hills. We
found a cave in one bank. Our
senior officer, a sergeant, said
we'd rest awhile and, since I
was the youngest, appointed me
the first guard of the night.

It was a lonely guard, and I
was desperately tired. Not long
after my comrades were asleep
an officer on a white horse rode
out of the dark. Later on I learn-
ed that it was general Copic.

“Who’re you,” he said, reign-
ing in. m
“Lincolns,” I said.
“How many?”
“Six.”

“Good,” said the general.
“This is the front line. We'll
make a stand here.” I stared in
amazement. Suddenly he grew
to giant proportions. Here was a
guy with a real imagination, I
thought.

“You can tell the sergeant
he'll get reinforcement,” his
voice faded into the night.

We did. Gathered up by Copic
from the. Macpaps, the British
and the Lincolns, a few hundred
men established a front line
against the fascists for 24 pre-
cious hours. Some _ remained
there forever.

Since then, there have been
lots of general Copics who took

a stand with a small group, saw
it as a front line of struggle,
and won. I think of that today
as the class struggles sharpen
in Canada. History always de-
mands that the dreams of a bet-
ter life be translated into re-

ality. (WB)

Editor —MAURICE RUSH
Published weekly at Ford Bldg., Mezzanine No. 3, 193 E. Hastings St.,

Vancouver 4, B.C. Phone 685-5288.

Circulation Manager, ERNIE CRIST
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PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1970—PAGE 4

we thi geo! Wee LAG

Act for labor's rights

With the mounting offensive against
labor, the silence and lack of action by
the leadership of the trade union move-
ment is inexcusable. Major battles are
shaping up. Big business has decided
to try to break labor’s back.

The capitalists count on their general

propaganda to confuse the working
people.
_ President of the Treasury Board
Drury, heeding His Master’s Voice—
The Canadian Manufacturers Associa-
tion—says strikes and collective bar-
gaining are obsolete. And so say the
governments of Quebec, B.C., Ontario
and Saskatchewan.

The gravest threat comes from Sas-
katchewan’s two-gun Ross Thatcher
who, like the rest, makes no effort to
conceal his hatred of the workers. He
says he will outlaw strikes this year
and make his anti-labor legislation the
main issue of a provincial election.

Although not the centre of Canada’s
economic and political life, Thatcher’s
threat is to make Saskatchewan the
pace-setter for the bosses. The situation
demands the unity of the trade union
movement across Canada in defense
of Saskatchewan workers.

From coast-to-coast the governments
of big business are preparing the great-
est anti-labor onslaught in history, en-
couraged by the inactivity and silence
of the trade union leaders. Their silence
contradicts the militant mood of the
trade union movement, which has cour-
ageously defied Trudeau’s wage freeze
and, in the case of some, the anti-labor
laws, often undergoing great hardships
to do so.

Their victories reflect the new cur-
rents and forces in the trade union
movement which mean that united,
labor can go on to win new victories
for the working people. The young
workers and women workers want
more than just to “keep up” with infla-
tion. All workers understand that scien-
tific and technological advance has
made it possible to satisfy all of their’

‘needs.

Class collaboration, as always,
threatens the workers by weakening
their struggles. The challenge before
the trade union movement is to trans-
late the militant will of its members

into a united struggle against the new

attacks. The militant, conscious sec-
tions of the working class will drag its
reluctant leaders into the battle for
trade union rights.

Questionable motives

The recent story of the defection of
Boris Dotsenko in the capitalist press
is an attempt by reaction to undermine
Prime Minister Trudeau’s impending
visit to the Soviet Union. Isn’t it inter-

esting that they haul these things out |

when something positive develops to
improve relations between Canada and
the Soviet Union?

More. It aims to intensify the drive
to anti-democratic, anti-labor actions
by the government and its police forces.
It is an effort to silence the left among

peel Try

» Darling of the right win

_ing because of the Trudeau goverl™

the professors, and in the universilie
It is intended to prevent the devel
ment of the exchange system of teac!,
ers and students between Canada 4!
the Soviet Union. e
— Pete
Worthington — has branded Dotsenk?
with his personal stamp of approva!~ |
a brand which opens the front doo
of all the Edmund Burke Society typ®

People’s memories are not so shot!
that they’ve forgotten that it was tht
same Dotsenko who wanted to remal
in Canada several years ago when !
exchange time was up. The univers!
did not back him. Now, he has bee?
qeibed to come to grips with the pro”
em. .

He has written a letter — a lett
which has been used far and wide ")
vilify the USSR and the socialist v
tem. Well, at least he has signed |
name to such a letter, let us say.

He has now learned the vernacil|
of the professional anti-communist.
the short time he has lived in Canait
he has mastered the terminology of 4
gutter. His “revelations” rea iden
cally with the stuff we get with a
hate literature, or from the pens °
J. Edgar Hoover and our own comm!
sioner of the RCMP. ql

Anyway, Dotsenko tells us that '
trusts in God. Well, well! Isn’t th
what’s printed on one side of one of |
American silver pieces?

The rich get the gravy

The capitalist press carried new
items revealing the generosity wit’
which the Trudeau administratl?
lavishes the taxpayer’s money on pb}
business,

New jet fighters — 74 of them nt |
valued at $138 million will go strat
off the assembly line into mothbal®
and may never be used. They are |
last, of a fleet ordered in a $215 milli”)
deal with Canadair Limited.

In addition, we are told that an a
craft carrier which cost $50 million tf
initial price and repairs, and "
knows how much to operate, has 10")
been sold for scrap at $750,000.

No howls about exceeding. the 6%
wage guidelines in this area. The fart
ers catch it for supposedly raising |
much wheat—but what about too ma?
planes?

In stark contrast — aside from th’)
fact that some people are now prope,
ing giving judges an increase of $1,00
a month — is the disturbing news tha
Toronto needs an additional $5.7 ml
lion to meet welfare costs, rapidly 1

Names or

ment’s policies,

Right across Canada unemploymet!
has driven up welfare costs, Citi
have put restrictions on the already ™
adequate standards of welfare becau™
they claim they don’t have enoug!
money to pay for dentures and glasse*|

In other words, capitalist gover™
ments can find money for obsolet
bombers, but none for up-to-dal®
humans.

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