B *c!

communism, ‘concepts according to which. doing the

greatest possible -harm to the Soviet Union and the other Socialist countries should be the paramount aim of United States’ foreign policy.

This is not to say, of course, that the American

_ Monopolies have revised their attitude towards social-

‘sm and communist ideas. Nothing has changed in this respect. But the stubborn facts of life taught the U.S. Tuling class to realize that by basing its policy wholly on a platform of militant anti-communism the American rgeoisie not only did not protect itself against other, very real dangers, but could considerably injure its own Class interests. Specifically, it began to sink in among € ruling American bourgeoisie that by wasting a vast Part of the national resources on the arms race and mili- lary gambles: the United States was only undermining Its Positions in the competitive struggle against the other Capitalist countries, dooming itself to monetary-finan- Clal upheavals and undermining the foundations of its ®conomic and political influence in the world. An elo- i admission of this truth was contained in the caus- bo, remark Louis B. Lundborg, former chairman of the Sard of the Bank of America, the biggest bank in the ie States and in the entire capitalist world, made, Tessing a Congressional committee. He said that ‘‘I Would like to be able to say to potential aggressors all

. Ver the world, ‘If you want to profit, if you want to own

| See don’t dissipate your energies in wasteful

os are —follow the example of Japan and Germany

ice World War II and be economically aggressive.’ ”’ That was not an isolated view. Such sentiments

: ] 9 The Korean War and execution of the Rosenbergs marked this period’s

deadly unification of imperialism and McCarthyism.

bec,

the ame SO widespread in the business world, i.e., among @ noted . bourgeoisie, as to entitle Richard J. Barnett, COnclys; merican student of foreign affairs, to draw the Sion that ‘‘since the mid-1960’s...the cost of benetite 8, the imperial system began to outweigh the lusiy, i; and that corporate leaders, proceeding ¢ly from economic criteria, were arriving at

a ry . Wi eusion that the realization of national interests P.-Dr € help of armed forces posed a threat to their

rty and profits. @

fra This Statement describes fairly accurately the

tiderate, Mind that has begun to shape up among a con- There Section of the American monopoly bourgeoisie. and mbutts of Course, groups holding a contrary view those yw) ing their eyes to the living reality, especially Nterests ch run counter to their immediate material terested j Case in point is the monopolies directly in- Calleg am military orders, making up the core of the so- thfluentign fo) industrial complex. They are a big and tire Tuli force. And yet they do not represent the en- ifiuence®,(128S of America. And although the political the relatiy, the military-industrial complex far exceeds tion, the le €conomic weight of the monopolies in ques- them bee bent on imposing a policy that suits q oe American ruling class as a whole, come into Us, Mon, Ict_ with many other influential groups. of “Poly capital.

In récent years this conflict of interests has taken particularly vivid forms. This is connected not only with foreign-policy difficulties, but also with the aggravation of many other problems. These are economic problems, in particular inflation and unemployment, the adverse balance of payments, the shaky position of the dollar, and difficulties in the world market; a complex of social problems, such as poverty in the richest of the capitalist countries, the problem of the American Black population subjected to particularly ruthless oppression, the crisis and decay of large cities, the monstrous crime rate, moral degradation, the growing rejection by the younger generation of traditional bourgeois ‘‘values’’; finally, ecological problems engendered by a rapacious attitude

The Cold War led us into the hot war

] ve 65 in Vietnam, the loss of 50,000 troops, the wrecking of our economy and prestige.

towards nature.

The aggravation of all these problems and the con- sequent growth of the working people’s class struggle and of the democratic movements seriously influenced also the foreign-policy views of a considerable part of American public opinion.

In the first place, its faith in the superiority of

American economic and socio-political institutions, of

the ‘‘American way of life,’ intensively preached in the course of decades, was considerably undermined. It was this thesis that American propaganda used in sub- stantiation of the United States’ claim to the right to implant its “‘ideals’’ all over the world, if necessary with the help of armed force. In conditions of the growth of the mass anti-war and. democratic movement in the USA it becomes ever more difficult to indoctrinate the public in this vein. As Professor Andrew Hacker, a noted specialist in the political and social problems of the United States, wrote, ‘‘For most Americans can no long- er believe that destiny commands them to carry capital- ism, Christianity, or the United States Constitution across the globe. Indeed, a growing number are persuad- ed that the quality of life now known in our nation is hardly an exemplary export for other lands.”

Food for serious thought was also given to millions of Americans by another question: should and, above all, could their country go on spending vast means and forces on the arms race and foreign-policy gambles instead of using them to solve pressing internal problems? The resulting ‘‘debate on political priorities’’ extended not only to the public at large, but also to a considerable section of the ruling circles.

Some spokesmen of the ruling circles began to call in question old political precepts, to demand a new ap- proach to many traditional policy concepts, including those pertaining to national security and national power, and to admit that the strength and international influence of the United States required, first and foremost, con- cern for the stability of its own rear, for the state of af-- fairs in America itself. By way of illustration we can quote General James L. Gavin, a prominent American military specialist and public figure. ‘‘What is the basis of power in this kind of world?” he asks. “Can it be reck- oned in terms of weapons? Number of divisions? Air- craft-carrier task forces? Or is it based on economic

Monopoly capitalism was forced to acknowledge new world realities = accept detente with the Soviet

.

worse

well-being? A very fundamental change in values has taken place in all the societies of this earth. Increasing- ly in the future, American strategy must begin with our own domestic condition...’° The conclusion Gavin draws is this: “*. . .the nature of conflict and competition is changing. We felt that future conflicts would be re- solved in terms of the economic and domestic condition of nations, and in terms of our commitment to research. That is one reason why I questioned the wisdom of our spending 30 billion dollars a year fighting in Vietnam at the expense of our economy and the State of our domestic affairs.”’

This viewpoint is not, by a long way, shared by all representatives of U.S. ruling circles. And yet such sen- timents are on the rise, becoming a factor in the United States’ political situation, especially in conditions when the long and bloody war in Vietnam has brought to the

. surface, as it were, these vital problems of American

policy and so intensified the internal struggle as to make most diverse sections of the public and many representa- tives of the ruling class comprehend and admit the nec- essity of change.

All this already manifested itself clearly enough in the course of the 1968 presidential elections. Richard

“Nixon, who won these elections, had promised not only

speedily to end the war in Vietnam but also to undertake a considerable reappraisal of the U.S. foreign-policy line. This reappraisal, the President had assured, would proceed along the lines of decreasing U.S. ‘‘involvement’”’ and foreign-policy commitments, and “transition from the era of confrontation to the era of negotiation’”’ with potential enemies, and above all with the Soviet Union.

In an analysis of the reasons for definite changes in American policy, among them those which made it possible to enter upon the path of normalization of rela- tions between the USSR and the USA, mention is often made of subjective factors, in particular President Nix- on’s striving to’score some major foreign-policy succes- ses in time for the 1972 presidential elections. it cannot be denied that the President did want to come to the elec- tions with major successes to his credit. It is also true that in the eyes of the Americans normalization of rela- tions with the USSR is one such success: by unanimous consent, Nixon owes his impressive victory in the last elections in large measure to the American voter’s high appraisal of the Moscow talks and the agreements with the Soviet Union.

All this is true. But references to the importance of subjective factors leave unanswered this basic question: why do American leaders, in search of popularity and electoral support, turn now to a policy of normalizing relations with the USSR and easing international ten- sion? Some fifteen years ago U.S. policy-makers (includ- ing those still active today) sought popularity and elec- toral victories in an entirely different sphere, that of anti-communism, hard-line anti-Sovietism, and the arms race. :

Clearly, the main part has been played by objective factors, by those major changes which have taken place in the world and in the United States itself.

, “The positive changes in the internatio Come not only of the changed correlation of foreign policy line of the Soviet Union, the line Which combines a firm rebuff tive policy of strengthening peace an

a

nal situation constitute a natural out- on of world forces, but also of the consistent of the 24th Congress of the CPSU, to imperialism’s aggressive moves with a construc- d promoting international cooperation.”

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 1973—PAGE 5