i’ And

Toronto mayor John Sewell ... “how can we expect to clothe, house
@ducate the children of the world when so much is spent on war.

TRIBUNE PHOTO — TOM MORRIS

A vow — ‘Never again’
Tribute to those lost in war

By TIM FEHER

TORONTO — Everyone was
silent as the bugle was played in
front of the memorial. The old
dreamed of how it was and the
young dreamed of how it would
be. Regardless of their age, how-
ever, they did share one common
dream. Peace.

The scene was Toronto’s City
Hall on Remembrance Day,
November 11. Hundreds turned
out to remember the 10 million
who perished in World War I. The
50 million who lost their lives in
World War II, the ‘“‘war to end all

~ wars’’ it was said.

Remembered was the massive
loss of civilian life during war-
time: 235,000 civilians perished
instantly when two atom bombs
were dropped on the Japanese
cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
During the Franco-Prussian war
of 1870-71, only two out of every
100 persons killed were civilians
and by the First World War 48 out
of every 100 persons killed were
civilians. By the Second World
War this figure had risen to 76.
During the United States’ war
against Vietnam, 98 out of every
100 persons killed were civilians.

The highlight of the Remembr-
ance Day was an inspiring speech

‘Canada quits nuclear family

i
® OTTAWA — A few weeks
fi *80, some mass circulation Cana-
ol ee Newspapers carried a small
‘tie’ item without direct quota-
bins: Teferring to remarks attri-
uted to Canada’s Defence Minis-
fn De Allan McKinnon. National
f efence Headquarters provides
= €xact words of the minister,
© spoke them in Washington,
Pa Sent, 26. -

When asked about the nuclear

3 le Canada should or should not
a °Y, he responded:

‘In Canada, when the new
fighter aircraft comes in, which
should be in the middle of 1982,
we’ll no longer need missiles on
the planes we have at the present
time, and that will be our last
physical possession of nuclear
weapons. As far as we're con-
cerned at that time we’ll be out of
the nuclear family completely, al-
though this doesn’t mean that we
oppose our allies’ position and it
doesn’t mean that we disagree
with the concept that NATO must
have nuclear weapons.”

In response to a question con-
cerning Canada’s intent to main-
tain a non-nuclear position,
McKinnon stated:

‘We think it’s a good example
to the countries of the world as we
did 25 years ago to have a nation
such as Canada, capable of pro-
ducing nuclear weapons, not
doing so. We hoped then and still
hope that it will serve as an exam-
ple to other countries that they
shouldn’t aspire to ownership of
nuclear weapons.”’

by Toronto Mayor, John Sewell.
Well known for taking a stand on
the issues of the day, Sewell did
no less in his address on Nov. 11.
He spoke of how we have come to
accept the slaughter that takes
place in war as a daily event, ‘‘a
commonplace so terrible, that we
have become numb. The terror of
war has a sense of distance about
it,’ he said.

Sewell went on to say that ‘‘the
world seems to have become so
much more complicated since
Remembrance Day became es-
tablished. Wars are no longer just
between soldiers. All civilians are
involved and suffer from the
curse. of bombs and other
weapons-at-a-distance.”’

Armaments Robbed Us

The mayor pointed to the fact
that throughout the world, more
than $400-billion are spent annu-
ally on armaments. He also refer-
red to the Canadian government’s
annual allocation of $4.5-billion to
its ministry of Defence. ‘‘Given
the problems we all experience
and given our knowledge of areas
where funds are required, (Cana-
da’s defence budget) is a very
large commitment,’ Sewell
added.

“‘The vast expenditure on
armaments has not brought our
planet closer to peace — but it has
robbed us of other improvements
that these funds could have pur-
chased,’’ Sewell said.

He went on to speak of the Year
of the Child, and posed the ques-
tion: :

*‘How can we expect to clothe,
house and-educate the children of
the world when so much of our
dollars are spent on armaments?”

Sewell urged disarmament was
the only hope for world peace. He
added that the people of Canada
have a limited knowledge of not
only the intentions of other world
governments but of the intentions
of our own as well. “We all feel so
lacking in information. We aren’t

aware of the options available,”’
he said.

Before and after the mayor's
speech, however, the Toronto
Association for ‘Peace (TAP),
displaying a massive banner —
Never Again — made itself
known as a source of information
on disarmament and peace ac-
tivities. f

TAP also distributed a leaflet
urging citizens to “urge U.S. rati-
fication of SALT-II,” and to
press the Canadian government
to ask President Carter ‘to stop
all plans to develop the neutron
bomb."’ The leaflet suggested
writing or phoning government
representatives on every level on
these serious concerns.

Reduce World Arsenal

Mayor Sewell, after describing
the destructive capacity of nu-
Clear weapons as “‘literally mind
boggling,”’ stated:

“Our commitment today must
be for a world in which there is
war no more. We must ask for
leaders to devise policies which
help free the world from war-like
tendencies, from’ such large
armaments expenditures ... re-
duce the world’s arsenal ...”’

After the ceremony, a TAP
member, commending the mayor,
said: *‘We can only hope that on
Remembrance Day 1980, war will
be a thing of the past, something
that exists only asa memory ...””

Contrasting with that, like a
sick joke, however, were news
announcer Tom Gould’s remarks
on the Global Television News-
week program that night. Gould
editorialized that even though the
USA often initiates war in its at-
tempts to assert its influence,
such action is necessary and far
better than seeing U.S. influence
decline in the world.

What a statement by a section

_of the mass media on a day of

peace and remembrance when
millions of people declared them-
selves, in various ways, for no
more war!

An internationalist?

« A Veteran of the class struggle writes:
to bes duaintance of mine, who claims
an we Socialist, says that in ofder to be
€mationalist one must first be a
and j stonalist. I don’t agree with him
Nation rider myself to be an inter-
Sthigy net: Would you comment on on
on aly, for this question bears directly
“abrogg “1258 struggle both at home ahd
} all que; It has to do with the question of
, “Whi Stions, immortalized in the song
|. 18h Side Are You On?”
ll
“Practice tionalism as understood and
Med y, ; by genuine socialists is sum-
an RE In these lines penned by Marx
) trie ngles: ‘Workingmen of all coun-
} they ‘pnite! And for what reason should
thing toi. Because they ‘‘... have no-
} ®Worldtg but their chains. They have
Natio, © win.”’ (Communist Manifesto)
bourgegh ism. On the other hand, is a
“Suborg:®. CORCept which in practice
| Workers ates the class interests of the
those of

vi

» And of all working people, to
» Wbethe; the Capitalist class. This is so
| tema those interests be national or
Wty, the srl For, in a class-divided soc-
“those of t national interests” are actually
‘ he dominant capitalist class.
Canada . . =? zt J
isa salt =
| cyte ae veloped capitalist coun
St class _ monopoly. This being

i

dominant section of the ©

Marxism-Leninism in Today’s World.

the case, if one is to be a ‘‘good”’
nationalist one must subordinate his
class interests to those of the banking and
industrial monopolists. To make his
peace with these modern buccanneers.
For instance, the Government of Cana-
da, acting in the profit interests of the
monopolies, is presently conducting an
all-out offensive against the living stan-

‘dards of the workers, farmers, seniors,

children, the sick and the maimed. This
assault is taking place in the name of the
‘‘national interest’, while at the same
time the giant corporations are reporting
rd profits. on
seats is example. Acting again in the
‘‘national interest’’. the Canadian
Government smashed the postal work-
ers’ strike and jailed its president and
other union officers. Was this in the in-
terests of the workers? Certainly not.

Did it serve the interests of the -

i i it was a
monopolists? Certainly. For i si
body ae struck against the trade union

movement as a whole. <
*

regoing are but two examples
cae cei) socialist must make up
his mind about once he yields to < e
bourgeois concept of the nation and: e
‘national interest’’. For to be a good
nationalist in a class-divided society 1s to

embark on the slippery path of class be-

trayal. This holds true no matter how
such *‘good’’ nationalists may twist and
squirm in self-justification.

This is not only true on the strictly
Canadian scene, it is more glaringly true
on the international scene. For, it is here,
that the ‘‘good’’ nationalist becomes an
“‘internationalist’’ on behalf of his
‘“‘own’’ monopolists on the international
scene, under the pretense of serving the
‘*national interest’. In other words he
subordinates the vital interests of the
international working class movement to
those of the international bourgeoisie, of
which Canadian monopoly capitalists are
part and parcel.

* * *

The acid test of our ‘‘good”’ nationalist
who professes to be also a socialist and
an internationalist (but in reality is only a
petty-bourgeois nationalist) is his at-
titude to the Soviet Union, the trail-
blazer of living socialism. Does he take
into account the complexity of problems
facing a trail-blazer in unexplored coun-
try? Oh no, not him. He is used to clearly
marked roads and streets. Does he up-
hold the Soviet Union as the foremost
champion of people’s democracy, world
peace, national and social liberation, so-
cial progress and socialism? No, not him.
He jumps on the band-wagon of anti-

Sovietism of his ‘‘own’’ bourgeoisie —
his ‘‘own’’ monopolists — who, intheir
own class interests, are deadly oppo-
nents of socialism, no matter what the
model or the label.

In the guise of a ‘‘friend’’ of the Soviet
Union he argues that socialism is okay
but it is the workers’ state that is defec-
tive. It is not ‘democratic’? enough,
which is the very same argument used by
his “‘own’’ bourgeoisie. By this is meant,

. take the power away from the working
class, let the enemies of the workers and
the farmers back into positions of power.
Our ‘‘good’’ nationalist pretends to
search for new models to cover up his
actual abandonment of the socialist ideal
and working-class internationalism.

* * *

And, finally, our ‘‘good”’ nationalist in

going over to the side of imperialism

. abandons also, the noble concept of pat-

riot. For, one cannot lay claim to being a
patriot of one’s country, while serving
the “‘national and international inter-
ests’’ of a country ruled by the mono-
polists. This is tantamount to betrayal of
the true national interests of the working
people. The true defender of Canada and
her people is the working class. The true
defender of the vital interests of all coun-
tries and all peoples is the working class of
these countries.

Herein, lies the brotherhood of man
the world over.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE— NOVEMBER 23, 1979— Page 9

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