“Visit a socialist country this year” (1965)

From the October 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard

 

“Visit a socialist country this year,” said the advertisement. The result of reading this was that one dreary Sunday morning several months later I found myself in the centre of Karl Marx Stadt, in the middle of a vast crowd, listening to a speech by Walter Ulbricht—First Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party, and Chairman of the State Council of the German Democratic Republic.

The “Socialist Unity Party” was formed by the union of the “Communist” Party and the Social Democratic Party in the Eastern sector of Germany on 21st April, 1946. Here, then, was the “socialism” of East Germany plain for all to see. The country’s leading party proclaimed itself a “socialist” party, the town of Chemnitz had been renamed after the socialist pioneer Marx, and—-to clear up any remaining doubts—the official travel guide (VEB edition, Leipzig 1962) announced, in terms that brooked no argument: “The German Democratic Republic is a socialist state.”

Ulbricht was addressing an international rally of pioneers—the youth organisations of the East European countries. Following his speech the children were marshalled and then followed a massive parade of the marching pioneers in their thousands, complete with uniforms, banners and martial music. It was certainly an impressive spectacle and, for sheer military precision, it must surely have equalled anything the Hitler Youth could have achieved. The party of Young Communist League members, with whom I was travelling, was wild with enthusiasm and evidently could see no contradiction between the sight of these herded and dragooned youngsters yelling their slogans in carefully rehearsed unison and the professed socialist nature of the organisations to which they belonged.

The Socialist Unity Party officials were continually bringing to our attention aspects of their country which, they contended, illustrated its “socialist” nature. A favourite example was the national health service. Yet Otto Lehmann—director of the East German social insurance service—has some interesting revelations to make on this subject:

“But there are also hidden reserves of labour power which can be tapped by improving workers’ health and living conditions . . . Herr Lehmann described how effective measures of this kind can be. In the Nunchritz chemical factory, for example, labour productivity and output were doubled and profits increased by 400 per cent between 1958 and 1963, while the sickness rate fell from 5.56 per cent to 4.81 per cent . . . These good results can be traced quite clearly to better working conditions and preventive health measures . . .” (Democratic German Report, February 19th, 1965).

This is reminiscent of nothing so much as Sir John Anderson speaking in the House of Commons and saying:

“On a long view the improved standard of health and education resulting from the development of the social services ought to increase enormously our productive efficiency as a community.” (Our italics. Hansard, 11th April, 1949).

How can it be that in “socialist” East Germany and capitalist Great Britain the national health services can find such identical justification? Yet this muddled thinking on the part of the membership of the “Socialist Unity Party” is less surprising when some of the profundities of its leader are examined. Walter Ulbricht can hardly be recommended as a beacon of socialist understanding. For example, he advises how socialism may be achieved “in some countries”:

“… the question can be examined as to whether the workers in some countries may not be able, under capitalist conditions, to use their political and economic struggle in order to reduce the power of the great monopolies, and later to “buy them out”.

Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx had considered this not only possible, but under certain conditions possibly the “cheapest way” of establishing socialism(!.), Walter Ulbricht recalled.” (Our emphasis. Democratic German Report. October 16th, 1964).

So there we have it, comrades; First Secretary Ulbricht (in the name of Marx and Engels) points the way to cut-price socialism.

However, the visit to East Germany was certainly not without value. For example, I learnt that by 1980 the wages system will definitely be abolished in the U.S.S.R.; or, at least, so one earnest young “communist” assured me. But, without a shadow of doubt, the burning question of the day in the “communist” world at present is nothing so mundane as the abolition of wage labour but, instead, the Sino-Soviet dispute. Ulbricht has clearly demonstrated his own discomfort on this issue. At a meeting in the Schwarze Pumpe coal combine on November 3rd, 1964 he stated in reply to questions about relations with China :

“I have no intention of avoiding this question . . . but I must say quite frankly that our knowledge is not great enough to say anything in detail about such questions.”

Within the rank and file of his party, however, opinions are expressed which—though they cannot be recommended being any nearer to the socialist position than Ulbricht’s—are, nevertheless, less bigoted. My most cherished memory of East Germany is of an argument with a member of the “Socialist Unity Party”. Because of the strange ideas I had been expressing, which he had evidently not bothered to listen to, he thought I must be a supporter of Mao tse-Tung and therefore launched into a violent attack on the Chinese leader. He ended by storming: “Mao tse-Tung is not a good communist!” I pointed out that surely Mao tse-Tung had been described as a great communist by Stalin and other leading communists in their day. Seeing his dilemma, he compromised: “Mao tse-Tung is a great communist but not a good communist”.

John Crump

China and America (1971)

From the September 1971 issue of the Socialist Standard

After more than twenty years of waging a propaganda war against each other and working up suspicions and hatred among their respective working classes, the American and Chinese mobster politicians are to seek some kind of reconciliation.

To those numbered in their millions all over the world, who mouthed and continue to mouth the slogans of Chinese capitalism denouncing “American imperialism”, and equally to all those who mouthed the phrases of American capitalism denouncing “Chinese expansionism”, it must seem as bewildering as were the Catholic church to suddenly get together with the League of Militant Atheists. After mountains of vitriolic propaganda, oceans of hate and the widespread belief that a real and unbridgeable ideological chasm separates the two sides, what explanation can there be for such a momentous reversal of attitudes?

Such about-faces are far from unheard of in the double dealing world of lies and hypocrisy which is capitalism. Stalin and the Bolshevik heads of Soviet capitalism got together with Nazi Germany and, after denouncing the war as imperialist, wound up on the side of British and American imperialism against their former Nazi friends. Conversely, Churchill who had spent twenty-five years denouncing the Soviet regime as a “cancerous growth”, wound up as head of British capitalism, supporting Soviet state-capitalism against Hitler and Mussolini (whom he had formerly admired).

Russia and China are capitalist countries, whose foreign policies, quests for world markets, world investments and military power only make sense when seen as part of the world-wide rivalry that characterises capitalism everywhere.

If the British capitalist class (or most of them) are jubilant at the prospect of multiplying their profits in the European market of 250 million people, large sections of the American capitalist class must have been biting their nails for years at the frustration of missing the pickings of the Chinese market.

During the years since 1948, trade, and even more so investment, has been rigidly restricted between Western capitalism and China. Successive American governments have pursued a policy of “containment”. For many years developing Chinese capitalism depended heavily on Russian equipment and technicians. But during the last ten years when the Russian and Chinese rulers have been embroiled in mutual abuse, technicians have been withdrawn. All this has forced capitalism in China to rely on its own resources and know-how. It has been found that containment and trade embargoes only meant less reliance on the outside world and a greater impetus for developing internal technology.

The priorities of capitalism in China are the same as in other powerful capitalist countries. They exploded their first A-bomb in October 1964 followed by their first H-bomb two years later. From then on it was only a matter of time before they mastered the rocket techniques for delivering them. This marked a significant turning point in how the West regarded the threat of China. When China put her first satellite into orbit in April 1970, Time magazine (11 May 1970) discussed the prospects of rockets and guidance systems and declared, “Peking beyond any doubt will, within weeks or months, possess at least the first elements of a nuclear missile force.” The article went on to review the likely impact on other countries and said “As Japan assumes a larger role in Asia, the country may feel the need for the superpower weapons to match its growing international status”. Which is all very ominous and shows how commercial struggles and military power go together.

During this period there was diminishing opposition to China’s entry into the so-called United Nations. It became known that despite all the mud-slinging, American and Chinese representatives had for years been meeting secretly in Warsaw.

True to their dedication to profits and military force, it took the possession of nuclear weapons to make American capitalism take Chinese capitalism seriously.

Nixon has pulled off the political coup of a life time—if things continue to go in a direction favourable to both sides. Which is not bad considering he does not officially recognise the existence of the Peking government. However, these get-togethers can burst into flame one moment and freeze over the next. But no doubt the masters of mass head-fixing on both sides will be ready to blame each other if it all turns sour. Just as Nixon and Chou-En-Lai will be seen on television smiling and embracing each other, having forgotten the threats of war and mutual destruction so the threats will be revived and the smiling forgotten, if after all it does not come off. An additional irony is that it should fall to Nixon to go sweet-talking in China, since it was he who first made his name as a red-baiter in the post-war years.

Peace is avowed as the heart-felt desire of both sides. And no doubt many millions of ordinary workers will welcome the prospect of diminished hostility. Any sign of hope will be grabbed at by a generation that has seen nothing but wars and military build-ups. But here again there is plenty of evidence to show how hollow these hopes are. There have been hundreds of conferences since the end of the Second World War and the major powers (America, Russia, France, China and Britain) have endlessly negotiated and yet there have been 73 wars including Korea and Vietnam, between 1945 and 1968. Many times hopes have been built up of reducing nuclear weapons, but despite negotiations they have steadily proliferated. After years of friendly relations, Russia and China came close to war in 1969. These two giants keep up the pretence of being different from imperialist America and Britain and used to heap admiration upon each other as “socialist” brothers. Yet they were driven to each other’s throats by the same sordid territorial ambitions as any openly capitalist countries.

What chance is there of China and America forming a relationship where commercial, strategic and territorial ambitions do not clash? It is precisely these interests which make capitalism what it is. The struggles for trade, investments, strategic positions and profits, make clashes inevitable.

The war in Vietnam has dragged on despite years of negotiations. All the suffering, death and destruction are as nothing to the negotiators who ruthlessly stick out for the interests they represent. China may now be expected to use her influence to pull American chestnuts out of the fire. Despite their support for North Vietnam and all the years of anti-American propaganda, such a service to American capitalism must now be regarded as a good bargaining lever. During 1966 China supplied the American air-force with steel for building air-bases in full knowledge of what this meant for their allies in the North. So both sides are well versed in the arts of cynicism and double-cross.

The Japanese government seems enthusiastic at the prospect of a new approach to China. Japan fought a long and bitter war to get her hands on the loot from China. What they failed to achieve by arms they now hope to achieve through the circulation of commodities. Japan is in an expansion frenzy and is hungry for raw-materials and markets.

There may be a period of mad scramble to get into China with capital investments to develop industry and extract minerals, but in the long-term, another massive rival for markets will emerge. Capitalism can operate in no other way. The smiles and frowns of politicians only reflect the prevailing situations presented to them by capitalism.

The final irony, to this latest stage of developments between China and America, might be Russian opposition to China’s entry into the UN. The Russian ruling class too have established “better relations” with Washington, so they may well play it cool. Their reaction will in any case be calculated to create whatever pressure is need to make Russian interests felt in what is going on.

Regardless of the public face they show, Russia, China and America will watch each other very closely. They are each in the same game for what they can get. The fact that friendly relations may exist for a time between each of them, should delude nobody. Trade does not mean trust. They will continue to spy on each other. Investments do not receive peace. They will each maintain their nuclear and other weapons.

Only the working class can get rid of this system of mutual suspicion, rivalry and war. This will involve establishing a world community where trade and investments and military force will have no place. Neither will the cynicism and hypocrisy of politicians.

Harry Baldwin

A Tory View of China (1963)

From the December 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

In an article in the Sunday Times on October 6th Sir Fitzroy Maclean, M.P., described the conditions he found on a recent visit and expressed the view that the peasants are better off than they were before the Communist Party got control of the government:

It is true that by one method or another they are regimented and made to toe the line. But they do not, as they used to, have the fear of actual starvation always hanging over their heads. Nor are they perpetually harassed by the rent collector and the money-lender or by the marauding war lords and bandits who caused such havoc.

He sees China developing militarily and economically and aiming to dominate Asia. He also noted that, despite the abuse the Chinese and Russian Communists hurl at each other there is one thing both countries (and all other countries) have in common:

In China, as elsewhere, how you live and what you buy depends on how much money you have. And who, it will be asked, has the money? The answer, as in the Soviet Union, is: the privileged classes, Officials, high-ranking officers, scientists, technicians, skilled workers and so on. But to those must be added a small and peculiarly Chinese category: the Communist Capitalists. These, surprisingly enough are the former owners of, for example, factories, whose enterprises have been taken over by the State and who receive annually from the State as compensation a percentage of the capital value of the enterprise. As they are also very often employed as managers of the factory, some of them are extremely well off.

Edgar Hardcastle

What’s happening in China (1965)

From the November 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard

The so-called communist rulers of China are in trouble. They are trying to achieve two impossible feats; to make exploitation popular with the Chinese workers and to kid them along that the form of capitalism which is developing there is socialism.

The latest campaign to accomplish this is called the “Socialist Education Campaign”, now in full swing, which was recently commended by the Chinese premier as being “of great revolutionary and historical significance”. Such campaigns are no novelty in “communist” China, where the workers seem to need a lot of convincing.

Previous campaigns have been passed off as methods of getting rid of the remains of capitalism or as part of the building-up of a “communist” system of society, or as the eradication of specific errors and failings of the Old China. They were represented as a necessary process of cleaning up and modernising the social structure and they dealt largely with problems that were laid at the door of the old era.

But this time it is different, in that the government leaders have to deal with problems which, they frankly proclaim arise directly from the present system of society. The “Socialist Education Campaign” is teaching workers, both in industry and the civil service, to deal with the new problems caused by the creation of a modern, technically developed state from a recently backward country. It is this which enables Premier Chou-En-lai to assign “historical significance” to the current campaign.

To enable them to reconcile awkward facts with an incorrect interpretation of society, the Chinese have to be dosed with plenty of “communist” education.

One problem with which they have to deal is that of the new “managerial class”. Mao-Tze-tung, Chou-En-lai and the rest of the old die-hards of the Communist Party, were tough, unscrupulous but courageous labour leaders tested in battle and called upon for great personal sacrifices in prompting the Communist Party to the leadership of what they may have once believed was a different system of society.

But the old guard are getting older, and they are finding it difficult to select their successors from the ranks of the new business bureaucracy who seem to be taking their place. These young people are slick, well educated executive types who are rising to the top in the nationalised concerns and government departments. They have little understanding of political theory, little desire to make personal sacrifices, but, like business executives the world over, are ambitious to rise in the hierarchy and enjoy the luxuries which only the possession of money makes possible. Such is a thumb-nail sketch of one of the groups that the die-hards are trying to impregnate with so-called communist ideology. But the die-hards are as horrified at this developing class, as the swan was when it found it had hatched a duckling. Capitalist society develops along its own lines, irrespective of the muddled thinking of its apologists.

An Tzu-wen, Director of the Organisation Department of the Party’s Central Committee, considered the nature of some of these groups in some detail in an article which appeared in the Party journal Red Flag on 22/9/64 and which was reported in the China Quarterly April/June 1965. An is primarily concerned with the campaign to train successors to the present leadership. He distinguishes between the older cadres of pre-liberation vintage who have failed to adapt themselves to the technical and organisational development going on, and the younger ones who have not the political benefit of those who went through the Civil War.

It is from An’s article that it is possible to build up a picture of the various groups he sees developing around him. His criticisms have been publicised to the greatest extent possible in the Chinese national press and on the radio. He said that the gravest dilemma for the Chinese leaders may be the conflict between their own background and the need for modernisation in economic planning.

Chou-En-lai made it clear in his report last December that one of the main motives behind the “Socialist Education Movement’’ was the need to prepare the country for economic expansion. He speaks of the need for a “scientific and realistic approach”. An calls on the older cadres to adapt themselves and he describes the movement as “a mass movement for studying Marxist-Leninist and Mao Tse-tung ideology with emphasis in its flexible interpretation and application”.

The Chinese Government are training the new managerial class to a degree which must involve contact with the thinking of the outside world and they are at the same time inducing the old die-hards to work efficiently in the fervent atmosphere of industrial capitalism, misnamed “socialist expansion”.

Another section being “educated” are the Chinese followers of the Russian communist party. Since it now seems that many of the interests of the Chinese ruling class are opposed to those of .the Russian, Chinese supporters must be “re-educated” to enable them to make an intellectual somersault. China is living in a capitalist world jungle and must be prepared, in its own interests, to support a war against its erstwhile “comrades”. There must be no fifth column in the Chinese camp.

Another homegrown problem is the rise of the wealthy farmer, a new economic group since the seizure of governmental power by the Chinese “communists”. With their surpluses of commodity crops they have made a mockery of the food and clothing rationing which still obtains in China. The black market is now known as the free market and is officially recognised by the Government. Any of the rationed goods can be obtained at a higher price and this is part of a process whereby the rural rich are becoming richer. Universal rationing for all has become rationing by price, officially lauded by the authorities. This, of course, is the state of affairs to which the workers of the rest of the world are accustomed, whether they are starving in the backward countries or the “affluent” of western capitalism.

China has had a somewhat different history of social development to the West over the centuries, so that capitalism there is a little different from capitalism here in some of the details. But Chinese workers have basically the same economic interests as the workers here; and the so-called communist government there behaves domestically and in its foreign policies, like the capitalist power that in fact it is.

Frank Offord

Chinese Hack Stalin (1956)

From the August 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard

The "Communist” ruling clique in China can scarcely conceal their jubilation over the volte-face in Russian policy since the recent Congress of the Soviet Communist Party touched off the new Party line of vilifying Stalin. But the Chinese go further in attacks on Stalin than Moscow—the beating of Stalin with proverbial scorpions started in an attack in an article on April 4th, that is, considerably before Kruschev’s much publicised speech on Stalin's misdeeds, published in The People’s Daily (the equivalent in China of the Times in this Country). The Russian attacks until that time had been confined to the period covering the last years of Stalin's life, but the Chinese went back as far as the late 1920's during the Civil War in China between the Communist Party and the Nationalists and show that by the Chinese Communist Party following Stalin’s dictates “the result was that instead of isolating the real enemy we isolated ourselves and inflicted blows on ourselves which benefited the real enemy." The Chinese level a variety of charges against Stalin including one that “Stalin failed to draw the lessons from particular, local and temporary mistakes on certain issues and so failed to prevent them from becoming serious errors involving the whole nation over a long period of time!!" The Russian ruling-class, for whom Stalin was for many years the chief spokesman, have in fact piled up quite an imposing lot of treacheries against their Chinese "Communist" comrades. Firstly, there, was Stalin's instructions to the Chinese Communist Party to co-operate with the Nationalists. The Nationalists, emboldened by this policy, suddenly turned on the Communists and butchered them in their thousands. Stalin abandoned them.

Chou-en lai, the present Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, was one of the Communist leaders in Shanghai who by a remarkable chance escaped. Mao-Tse Tung and the rest of those elsewhere who escaped are not likely to forget this formerly unpaid debt to Stalin that they now have a chance to work off. Secondly, during the blockade of the Chinese Communists by the Nationalists it was the Soviet advisers under the control of Stalin who advocated the disastrous policy of static warfare. It was when this policy was abandoned that the Chinese Communist Armies became more mobile and became more successful. But this was learning the hard way and meanwhile Chinese Communists were driven by the Soviet advisers like pigs to the slaughter.

But there was also the question of Stalin's disastrous theory to overcome. Stalin considered peasants as being merely the “packhorses of civilisation" and that no revolutionary party could be built on them. The advice therefore to the Chinese was to capture the cities and thus to get the city proletariat into the revolt—no workers, no Communism. That was the Russian dogma—but it was in the cities that the Nationalists were the strongest and the Communists were not able to hold a single large city, being repulsed with tremendous losses.

At the conclusion of the second world war when the Japanese capitulated to Russia their arms and ammunition and their control of Manchuria and China were handed over by Statin not to the Communists who had borne the brunt of the Chinese war against the Japanese but to their mortal enemies the Nationalists. Thus was the Chinese civil war again precipitated, plunging the population into all the horrors that a civil war can cause.

The Chinese Communists could not be expected to miss a chance to vent their spleen on Stalin—their pet aversion—and all this is thoroughly understood by those in power in Russia at the moment. Mao Tse Tung was the only leader of the Soviet bloc countries who did not go to Moscow for Stalin’s funeral.

The latest developments in the Soviet Union cannot be understood properly if one fails to see them in the perspective of Soviet relations with other countries, and Soviet/Chinese relations occupy, in this respect, a position of special importance. Foreign policies of capitalist countries are intimately linked with their need for foreign trade. Industrial enterprises usually are concerned with development of their production. Sometimes the effect of many concerns all expanding as best they can produces an overall picture of haphazard development whereby the existing markets can no longer absorb the products produced and it becomes imperative to expand these markets and enter new ones. This is where foreign policy can be useful such as in opening the way for trade by friendly relations and by conducting trade treaties. The State Capitalist economy of Russia is no exception to all this.

Since Stalin's death Russia has been desperately trying to develop economic and diplomatic relations with any country who might reciprocate. Stalin died in March, 1953, leaving not only a legacy of strained Soviet/Chinese relations, but a rival figure in world Communism—Mao Tse-Tung—the head of a State with a population of 500 million. Mae Tse-Tung was the leader of an Asian Communist Party who had achieved victory in an Asian country moreover not with Russian advice but against it. Furthermore, many of the countries of S. E. Asia have a sizeable Chinese minority who because of their position of dominance in various trades and industry wield a power out of proportion to their numbers. These Chinese look to Mao Tse-Tung and China for inspiration and backing. Stalin is no more: Russia is a long way away. But China is closer, and anyway has three times the man-power of Russia which sees influence passing to the Chinese.

The Chinese were quick to press their advantage. Chou En-lai visited India and Burma, where he signed with Nehru and U.Nu the five principles of co-existence. His participation in the Bandung Conference, together with visits of other Chinese leading personalities, has enhanced Peking's prestige in Asia.

Long before they visited this country, Bulganin and Krushchev in October, 1954, went to Peking. At the close of the visit a communique was issued containing a number of political and economic concessions by the Soviet Union to China. Since then Russian policy has been to make further concessions to China. They also went on a barnstorming tour of other Asian countries and outdid the Chinese by offering economic concessions to successfully expand Russian trade.

The violent attacks on Stalin by the Chinese Communists should not be ascribed to personal bitterness. Were this the case, then surely these attacks would have been made at the times when Stalin perpetrated those foul actions and personal feelings were running high. Presumably it was not advisable in the interests of the budding capitalism of China to bring these points up before. There is little emotion entering into the apparent friendships between Capitalist groups either within the “Communist" block or the “Democratic” group. “Friendship" is merely an expression of foreign policy which is liable to change to suit altered conditions. Capitalist friendship frequently conceals throat-cutting, their advice may be pitted with treachery (as the Chinese Communist found out to their cost), co-operation may camouflage competition and co-existence conceal moves to “liberate” and exploit weaker groups.

The attacks on Stalin by the Chinese should be considered as the expression of one expanding power to a rival, and, incidentally, as revealing the stresses and contradictions in Capitalist relations of the type that this system of society continually throws up.

Frank Offord

New China (1960)

Book Review from the July 1960 issue of the Socialist Standard

China—New Age and New Outlook, by Ping-Chia Kuo. Penguin Books. 3s. 6d.

In this eminently readable book the author discusses the great changes which are going on in China. He seeks to appraise and interpret current developments as a stage in the broad sweep of Chinese history and to search out the trends that have led to the triumph of the Communist Party, and to discuss the problems involved in this process. He takes in the pertinent points in China's past as well as what he can judge of its future. He says that with the collapse of the feudal system in 200 B.C., land was freely bought and sold and that this led to a concentration of ownership in the hands of the new privileged group and to the growing importance of the landlords as a social class. A great proportion of the peasantry continued to till the land, but did not own it, while the new class of owners exploited the peasantry.

In the course of the last twenty centuries the line of demarcation between the two segments of Chinese society became more steeply drawn. Economically, the landlords virtually controlled the tens of thousands of villages, and moreover, were the only group with the leisure to study and master politics. Thus the government had to fall back on them for the necessary personnel to operate the administrative machinery. This is why in every dynasty the Chinese government was virtually run by men of the landowning families. The tight grip on power by the landlord class was made more enduring by the adoption of Confucianism as the standard education for all officials. For twenty centuries Confucianism blocked progress and change, taught the oppressed to obey and impressed upon the minds of men the virtue of upholding the rule of the landlords. But, in recent times, the development of industry brought the seeds of change and made the collapse of the ancien régime inevitable.

The Nationalist movement, later to be led by Chiang Kai-Shek, left the landlord elite in control of the administration below country level. Thus land reform was effectively blocked. The Communist Party, on the other hand, realised that to develop the country the landlords, as a social class, must be eliminated. To obtain the support of the peasantry, they redistributed land confiscated from the landlords amongst the peasants in those out-of-the-way small sections of the country where they had seized control. This whetted the appetite for Communist Party land reform in the territory controlled by the Nationalists. The plight of the peasants was worsened by the disruption of World War II and, in 1949, the Communist Party were able to seize power on the mainland, leaving the Nationalists, backed by the U.S.A., in control of the island of Formosa. The process of modernising China has been proceeding rapidly. The large holdings of the landowners were quickly distributed amongst the peasants. Then came mutual help groups organised amongst the peasants. This was the thin edge of the wedge in converting the peasant into a landless agricultural wage worker. This primitive organisation gave way to voluntary agricultural co-operatives from which the peasant could withdraw if he so wished. Then on to the next stage—the collectivised farms and finally to the last stage, the Commune.

The Communes consist of 4,000 to 10,000 households. Their central purpose is to expand agricultural production which in turn would speed up industrialisation. The Commune makes monthly payments in the form of a basic wage classified in accordance with the graduations of the members' work performance, plus bonuses for workers who contribute more than the norm. This is clearly a system based upon the principle of “to each according to his work," a principle whose aim is to stimulate production. By making the production unit bigger the state makes it impossible for the peasants to pursue individual production except as wage-earners in the employ of the state. But the greatest benefit to production is that the Commune takes on industrial as well as agricultural functions. Perhaps the most dramatic aspect of this development has been the emergence of tens of thousands of small furnaces in the villages, producing pig iron or carbon steel and making farm implements. The fundamental force motivating Communist China’s new role in international affairs is her militant nationalism, which has advanced a new balance of power in the Far East and has helped to produce the tension in world affairs that we are now witnessing. For the moment, the author says, the addition of Soviet military material and Chinese man-power could create a giant army in case of war and this is partly responsible for the Sino-Soviet Alliance.

The author is typically Chinese in the practicality of his approach and in his logical method of thought unburdened by the religious thought typical of the average Western writer. To read this book is to glimpse an insight into the great depth of learning of its author, who incidentally is a Professor of History in an American University. Such a wealth of knowledge makes a mere amateur student of Chinese affairs like your reviewer feel humble. Yet Socialists know that Dr. Ping-Chia Kuo just does not really understand the world of which he writes. He reveals his belief that China is socialist and is ideologically opposed to the capitalist parts of the world. The Socialist sees a world of capitalism, but Dr. Kuo sees two worlds, with Socialism existing side by side with capitalism, and thinks that both, like sheep and goats on one farm, must be taught how to live together. In his book he makes various suggestions as to how this could be accomplished. What the Socialist views as merely the development of capitalism in China, he sees as “Socialist reconstruction” and he adds a plea to the United Nations to understand and befriend China in the interests of peace and goodwill. Nevertheless, to those who are interested in China as one of the possible bogey-men of the capitalist future, this is a useful book to read.

Frank Offord

The anti-imperialist delusion (1998)

From the August 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the course of the 20th century socialism, as a word, came to be transformed from a doctrine and aim associated with the emancipation of the working class into a doctrine and aim associated with the coming to power of nationalist, anti—imperialist elites in the economically less developed parts of the world.

The starting point was the coming to power in Russia in 1917 of an elite which had inherited its ideology from the workers movement but which in practice used the state to develop Russia economically and turn it into a power that challenged the domination of the world by America, Britain and France. As such it provided an attractive model for modernizing elites in other countries suffering from economic backwardness and domination by the advanced industrial capitalist states of the West.

The trouble was that this elite continued to use the language and terminology of the workers movement with which it had once been associated. Thus they described their seizure of power as a “workers’ revolution” arid their regime as a “workers’ state”, the first breakthrough by the international workers movement which workers everywhere had a duty to support. And they described the accumulation of capital under the auspices of the state which they were carrying out, not as the state capitalism it was, but as “socialism”.

Marx, who had pointed out that when studying history you should not analyze social and political movements by what they said they were doing but by the material results of what they did, would have been the first to understand (if not to appreciate) how socialism, indeed how his own theories, had become the banner under which a quite different struggle was fought out.

The English Revolution of the 1640s was carried out under an ideology derived from the Old Testament. The French Revolution of the 1790s was carried out under one derived from Roman times. The Russian Revolution, which was the equivalent in Russia of these anti—feudal revolutions, was carried out under an ideology derived from the workers movement but it was no more an attempt to establish socialism than the English Revolution had been to establish the New Jerusalem or the French to revive the Roman Republic.

Although it was Mao who replaced the slogan “Workers of the World, Unite” by “Oppressed Peoples of the World, Unite”, the roots of this change of perspective go back to Lenin.

Lenin’s highest stage

In exile in Switzerland in the middle of the First World War Lenin wrote a pamphlet which he entitled Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism. In it he argued that, through a process which had been completed by the turn of the century, capitalism had changed its character. Industrial capital and bank capital had merged into finance capital, and competitive capitalism had given way to monopoly capitalism in which trusts, cartels and other monopolistic arrangements had come to dominate production. Faced with falling profits from investments at home, these monopolies were under economic pressure to export capital and invest it in the economically backward parts of the world where higher than normal profits could be made. Hence, Lenin went on, the struggle by the most advanced industrial countries to secure colonies where such “super-profits” could be made.

Lenin exaggerated both the degree to which capitalism had become monopolistic and the difference between the rate of profit at home compared with in the economically backward parts of the world. But it was the political implications of his theory that were to prove the more damaging to the workers movement.

When, after 1917, Lenin became the head of the Bolshevik regime in Russia the theory was expanded to argue that the imperialist countries were exploiting the whole population of the backward areas they controlled and that even a section of the working class in the imperialist countries benefited from the super—profits made from the imperialist exploitation of these countries in the form of social reforms and higher wages,

This was nonsense in terms of Marxian economics which does not measure the level of exploitation by how high or low wages are but by reference to the amount of surplus value produced as compared with the amount of wages paid, whether high or low. By this measure the workers of the advanced countries were more exploited than those of the colonies, despite their higher wages, because they produced more profits per worker.

Lenin’s expanded theory made the struggle in the world not one between an international working class and an international capitalist class, but between imperialist and anti-imperialist states. The international class struggle which socialism preached was replaced by a doctrine which preached an international struggle between states.

The Russian revolution itself was situated in an anti-imperialist context. The whole thrust of Marx’s own analysis of capitalism was that the workers movement would first triumph in the economically advanced parts of the world, not in a relatively backward economic area like Russia. Lenin explained away this contradiction by arguing that Marx had been describing the situation in the pre-imperialist stage of capitalism whereas, in the imperialist stage which had evolved after his death, the capitalist state had become so strong that the breakthrough would not take place in an advanced capitalist country but in the weakest imperialist state. Tsarist Russia had been the weakest link in the chain of imperialist countries and this explained why it was there that the first “workers revolution” had taken place.

This was tantamount to saying that the Russian revolution was the first “anti-imperialist” revolution, and in a sense it was. Russia was the first country to escape from the domination of the Western capitalist countries and to follow a path of economic development that depended on using the state to accumulate capital internally instead of relying on the export of capital from other countries.

In the early days of the Bolshevik regime, when Russia was faced with a civil war and outside intervention by the Western capitalist powers, Lenin realised that this was a card he could play to try to save his regime. Playing the anti-imperialist card meant appealing to the “toiling masses” of Asia not to establish socialism but to carry out their own anti-imperialist revolutions. The ‘super-exploited” countries were to be encouraged to seek independence as this would weaken the imperialist states, who were putting pressure on Bolshevik Russia.

This strategy was presented to the workers movement in the West as a way of provoking the socialist revolution in their countries. Deprived of their super-profits, the ruling class in the imperialist countries would no longer be able to bribe their workers with social reforms and higher wages; the workers would therefore turn away from reformism and embrace revolution.

After Lenin’s death in 1924, this strategy of building up an “anti-imperialist” front against the West was continued by his successors. Because it taught that all the people of a colonial or a dominated country had a common interest in obtaining independence, i.e. a state of their own, it was very attractive to nationalist ideologists and politicians in these countries.

They called on all the inhabitants of the country they sought to rule to unite behind them in a common struggle to achieve independence. As a result, in these countries “socialism” became associated with militant nationalism rather than with the working-class internationalism it had originally been. The political struggle there came to be seen as a struggle, not between the working class and the capitalist class, but as a struggle of all patriotic elements – workers, peasants and capitalists together – against a handful of traitorous, unpatriotic elements who would have sold out to foreign imperialists.

Whereas in Europe and North America, and parts of Latin America, socialism was a movement for the emancipation of the working class represented by various different currents in Asia and later in Africa and the rest of Latin America it was the name of a nationalist, revolutionary anti-imperialist movement. Marxism, in its original sense, has never really existed in many of these countries. What passed for Marxism was in fact Leninism and it appealed to revolutionary modernising intellectuals rather than to workers. It has only been towards the end of this century that groups of workers in these countries have come to realise that Leninism and its anti-imperialist ideology had nothing to do with real socialism. But the damage had been done. To millions of workers in these parts of the world socialism still means nationalism and state capitalism which some of them still they see as something positive rather than a barrier to the working-class co-operation across frontiers which is an essential condition for socialism.

Through the influence which state capitalist Russia used to have over a part of the workers movement in Western countries this is what it came to mean to many working class militants in these countries too. The Russian rulers used the Communist parties outside Russia as simple auxiliaries to their foreign policy which was based on the strategic interests of Russia as an up-and-corning (state) capitalist power. What was “progressive” was what coincided with Russia’s foreign policy’ interests.

During the 1950s Russia moved towards a policy of acceptance of the status quo with the West known as “peaceful coexistence”. The Chinese Leninists, who had come to power under Mao in 1949, perceived the interest of their state differently and sought to become the champion of “anti-imperialism” in place of Russia.

The splits that resulted in the world Communist movement were thus provoked, not as might superficially appear to be the case, by differences over what tactics the workers movement should pursue but over which so-called socialist country’s foreign policy – Russia’s or China’s – should be supported. This was not a dispute which concerned the working class interest at all, but was an argument between states in which workers were being asked to choose whose foreign policy pawns they wished to be.

Lenin’s theory of imperialism had contained the seeds of such a shameful outcome from the start as it made the most significant struggle at world level not the class struggle but the struggle between states, between so-called anti- imperialist and progressive states and so-called imperialist and reactionary states. This was a dangerous diversion from the class struggle and led to workers supporting the killing in wars of other workers in the interest of one or other state and its ruling class.

Adam Buick

Olympic invitation (1988)

From the May 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard

Many commentators were taken aback by the apparent volte-face conducted by China and Russia when they recently accepted South Korea’s invitation to the 1988 Olympic Games. This seemed particularly odd since their regional ally "Communist" North Korea, bitterly opposed participation on the grounds that it amounted to a virtual recognition of the US-backed Southern regime.

The confusion over these manoeuvres stems from the mistaken belief that leaders determine foreign policy in line with their ideological interests. In opposition to this view, the materialist analysis of international relations holds that there are underlying economic forces which determine, over the long run, what actions leaders take. Seen in this light, the "mystery" of the Olympic acceptance is soon resolved.

Following the enforced division of the Korean peninsula by the United States in 1948, Russia and China maintained a seemingly implacable hostility towards the South and lent their support to the Northern regime's drive to re-unify the country. The importance of the North to China and the Russians was dramatically enhanced by the bitter conflict which erupted between these two states in the 1950s and '60s. North Korea occupied a critical strategic position, flanking vital industrial and military regions on both sides. Ritual denunciation of the Southern regime became an important weapon in the struggle to secure the support of the North's dictator. Kim I'-Sung.

The situation began to change in the late 1970s and early '80s. when the stagnation of the Russian and Chinese economies galvanised their respective party bureaucracies into an enforced process of economic modernisation. A necessary condition for success was a massive injection of western capital and advanced technology, which required a downgrading of cold war hostility and an opening up to the United States and its allies through the process of detente.

South Korea occupies a key position here. It is located in the fastest developing economic region in the world and is growing at a more rapid pace than Japan. Its per capita GNP is $2,900, at least three times that of the North. Furthermore, South Korean industry has direct access to the latest technology from the United States and Japan and its manufacturers have proved themselves adept at integrating aid, successfully utilising their advances as, for example, in the development of the four megabit DRAM computer.

The Chinese were the first to attempt to tap into these resources. In the early 1980s they established trading links with the South through Hong Kong and between 1983 and 1985 two-way trade rose from $285 million to over $800 million, exceeding China's trade with the North. More recently a covert direct trade has begun to develop. South Korean businessmen have visited China, and in 1986 the Daewoo Corporation spearheaded the first ever joint venture with a Chinese company, producing television sets in the Fujian province.

The South Koreans have been anxious to encourage these links since China has a lot to offer them: cheap labour, low corporate taxation and an alternative to the increasingly protectionist United States market. President-Elect, Roh Tae Woo, has promised to develop the South West province of Challa as a free trade zone to exploit these possibilities.

The Russians have been more circumspect in making openings to South Korea, principally because of the strategic benefits they derive from naval facilities at Cam Rhan Bay in the North, as well as overflying rights for their military aircraft. The importance of these assets has diminished, however, as the Soviets attempted to create a stable regional environment in which they could pursue economic modernisation. This involved seeking a rapprochement with China and increasingly dissociating themselves from Kim I'-Sung's wilder demands for a military solution to the division of Korea. The last thing the Russians wanted was a clash with either China or the United States, which would have diverted resources away from economic development and threatened the flow of Western technology and capital. Consequently the Russian leadership has moved to relieve tensions with China and has tacitly accepted the present division of Korea as more or less permanent.

These shifts have resulted in the downgrading of the relative importance of the North in Russian thinking. For example, in the early 1980s they were notably reluctant to supply North Korea with advanced MIG 23 fighters, and did so only in response to United States' introduction of F-16s into the South. This reassessment was reinforced by the financial burden to the Russians of supporting the North. Kim I'-Sung's attempts to build an "independent" economy had resulted in an efficient and aging heavy industrial base patterned after Stalin's programmes of the 1930s. The North today has a trade deficit of $465 million and has consistently failed to repay its loans, much to the irritation of some Western capitalists who are now exceedingly reluctant to extend financial or technological assistance. In pursuit of economic self-sufficiency. Kim I'-Sung has also refused to join COMECON and integrate the North more fully into the Russian empire. This has remained a constant source of tension. The Russians are already overextended economically with their commitments in Vietnam, Africa and Afghanistan and strategic returns from their investment in North Korea no longer seem worth the immense cost.

For both China and Russia ideological hostility towards South Korea clashes with the demands generated by the need for economic modernisation. As Marxists would expect, this contradiction is resolved by bringing the ideology into line with changing economic circumstances. The acceptance of South Korea's invitation to the 1988 Olympics is an important part of that process.

Andrew Thomas

News in Review: Nkrumah falls (1966)

The News in Review column from the April 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nkrumah falls

After Nigeria, Ghana. After Ghana— where?

The African continent is crowded with newly independent states with leaders who, having come to power on the promise of freedom, have established dictatorships. Some of these have been described, with breathtaking audacity, as “One Party Democracies” or something similar. But whatever lies are used to excuse them, the fact is that these countries are dictatorships where only one political party is legal and where opponents of the regime are usually imprisoned or exiled.

The Africa which was once the plaything of the imperialists is now in a turmoil under its suppression. It may well be that Nkrumah is not the last dictator there to lose his office.

The history of independent Africa must be a great disappointment to the supporters of organisations like the Movement for Colonial Freedom, who were once so insistent that freeing Africa from European rule would give the continent a happier, more democratic way of life.

It was obvious from the outset that these organisations did not understand the problem they were dealing with. It was clear that the alternative to rule by the colonial powers was simply rule by a native government. At the best, this was the replacement of one type of suppression by another.

Sometimes it has turned out worse that that. In Dr Banda’s Nyasaland, for example, the government recently pushed through an Act which revived public executions—something abolished by the British when they occupied the country.

And sometimes, of course, it has meant outright dictatorship, with a leader surrounded by sycophants and living in continual fear of his life. This was Ghana under Nkrumah.

The African states have not yet absorbed a lesson which some of the older capitalist powers have found useful. A political opposition has its uses. It acts as a brake on a government's excesses, it is a method through which a country’s capitalist class can exert pressure on a government, and by publicising facts which are inconvenient to a government it actually keeps that government in touch with reality.

Nazi Germany, as many of its military, industrial and scientific leaders have since testified, suffered as a capitalist state because of the intricate, intolerant nature of the Hitler dictatorship. And it is hard to believe that Nkrumah would have gone to Peking if he had reason to think that his power was being undermined.

The fact that he did not realise this was, in very great part, due to the lack of an opposition in Ghana. Had there been one, it would have reflected the growing discontent with Nkrumah’s regime and with the country’s increasing economic difficulties.

The absence of a safety outlet meant that the whole thing exploded and Nkrumah, the great dictator, the redeemer, the man who thought that a dictatorship would keep him in power and would make him Africa’s man of destiny, has been hoist with his own petard.

Lord Robens said it

Lord Robens, who is chairman of the National Coal Board, is the best friend the miners ever had. Who said so? Lord Robens himself.

A couple of months ago Robens was made a Director of the Bank of England —a job which, as everyone knows, was created with the special intention of being friendly to the miners.

This elevation came after some years of Lord Robens busily closing pits and sacking tens of thousands of workers in the coal mining industry.

Of course, this process was never vulgarised with the name “sacking”. The Bank of England probably called it rationalisation. Politicians like Mr. Wilson probably call it modernisation. Lord Robens, presumably, calls it being the Miners’ best friend.

The mineworkers, however, have been doing a bit of rationalisation of their own with results which have made Lord Robens feel less than friendly.

Many of them have noticed the large scale sackings which have been carried out. They have also read in the newspapers that the National Coal Board has plans for more closures, more redundancies. Not unexpectedly, a lot of them have decided that the Coal industry holds no future for them, and they have been getting out of it.

During 1965 a total of 38,000 people left the Coal industry. But this was twenty thousand more than the Coal Board intended; they had planned to sack only eighteen thousand. The rest left on their own accord, which has caused Lord Robens to complain:

  The run out at this pace was something of a disaster for us. It has had a very adverse effect on the financial turn-out of the Board.

Now it is obviously very inconsiderate of the miners not to sit down and wait until the Coal Board decides to clear them out, and to jump the gun by going out and finding another job before everything is ready for them to be sacked like docile, boss fearing workers should be.

Perhaps they are applying the same standards as Lord Robens applies to the workings of the mines. He is interested in making a profit; they are interested in a secure wage. Perhaps they are disillusioned with nationalisation, which Lord Robens, when he was plain Alf and a member of the post war Labour Government, supported but which he is not so sure about now:

  He (Lord Robens) was in favour of rationalisation of the coal distribution trade but no nationalisation. (The Guardian 8/3/66).

Whatever the truth of this, one thing is certain. The miners who are leaving the Coal industry are doing no more than try to protect their interests in a social system which continually attacks them. Whether they succeed or not they cannot be criticised for taking the action; capitalism is a world where everyone fights for himself.

Least of all can the miners be criticised by those who so assiduously uphold capitalism, as politicians, as employers, as leaders of capitalism’s symbols of commerce and privilege. In this respect, Lord Robens lives in a very fragile glass house, and he should be the last person to throw lumps of coal.

Communist confusion

The Communist Party, which has never been famous for clear thinking, is deeper in confusion than ever.

To start with, they are hopelessly split over the quarrel between China and the Soviet Union. These two countries were, after all, once supposed to be in inseparable comradeship in the struggle for Socialism—and here they are squabbling over all the classical capitalist issues like frontiers and trade routes and spheres of influence.

For the Communist who takes seriously the claim that Socialism exists in Russia and China, the choice between the two must be next to impossible.

Then there are events like the recent trial in Russia of the writers Daniel and Sinyavsky, for allegedly criticising the Soviet regime. The Communists are in more than one mind about this.

Should they automatically condemn the two writers, as they have done in similar cases in the past, as enemies of the people, saboteurs of freedom, imperialist agents and the rest of the terminology which we all know so well by now?

Or should they agree with John Gollan, Secretary of the Communist Party in this country, when he said that “The handling of this affair has done a greater disservice to the Soviet Union than the works of Sinyavsky and Daniel”?

For a Communist who has always dutifully believed that the Soviet can do no wrong, and that the Russian government is incapable of prosecuting a man unless he is guilty (even before he has been tried) the choice here must be very difficult.

And what about the Communist Party's decision to abolish the Daily Worker and replace it this month with a paper called the Morning Star?

Is there not something honourable, to a Communist, in the word worker? Should he not be proud to sell a paper with it blazoned across the top?

Or is the Communist Party now trying to cover the association which it has always claimed with the working class movement? Has it gone in for a bit of market research and discovered something which was obvious anyway—that the history of the Daily Worker had made it, for many members of the working class, a bad joke?

Perhaps the name Morning Star is simply part of the Communist Party’s efforts to get in on the latest craze of modernisation. At their rally last month at the Festival Hall, the Communist Party were claiming loudly that they were the real modernisers of British capitalism.

They were demanding more expenditure on schools, a nationally integrated transport system, reduced arms spending. And naturally there were the usual inducements of magnificently generous pensions, family allowances and so on—generous in direct proportion to the unlikelihood of the Communist Party getting power and having to implement them.

All of this must have been very confusing to any member of the Communist Party who strayed into the hall under the impression that he belonged to an organisation that had something to do with Socialism. It must have been confusing to those who remembered the wartime days when the Communists wanted more spent on arms, and the days when, far from supporting modernisation, the Communist Party was opposing the Attlee government’s productivity drive.

Yes, all very confusing—unless we grasp a basic fact. The Communist Party, whatever it claims for itself, does not stand for Socialism and never has done. It is merely another, if rather peculiar, party which supports capitalism.

And that is exactly the reason for their changes of policy—and for the splits and arguments and confusion they cause among the party’s misguided supporters.

A boring business

Everyone knows that at election time political parties promise all sorts of rewards to people who vote for them— provided, of course, enough of them vote to get the right side into power.

From another point of view, though, the electorate deserve some sort of recognition for the tremendous effort they make to find something to distinguish the Labour Party from the Conservatives and, having found it, to make enough of an issue of it to persuade themselves to vote one way or the other.

At one time, perhaps, this was a little easier. There was a time when the Labour Party breathed the fire of revolution—or at any rate when they wanted to nationalise a few industries, which they passed off as Socialism. There was a time when the Tories stood for red-blooded Private Enterprise and for the British- Empire-On-Which-The-Sun-Never-Sets.

These were at any rate clear differences between the two parties, even if they were superficial. But even that has changed now.

Ever since the Labour Party came to power after the war, they have inexorably travelled the road which their nature and their policies laid out for them. They have grown more and more like the Tories. They have tried—how they have tried during the past few years!—to convince the electorate that they are no more than an alternative method of running capitalism, with no more nonsense about social revolution.

This has had its effect. Mr. Wilson has been openly referred as the best Conservative Prime Minister we have. Very few serious political correspondents pretended during this last election that there were

any real differences between the two sides.

  . . . no one could maintain that there is a black and white difference either in the politics or the competence of this Labour Government and its Conservative predecessor. (Robert McKenzie in The Observer). 

  If a Tory Government were returned it would either have to pursue similar economic policies or instigate an about-turn. If the first applies we might as well stick to the present lot. If the second were to happen, we should have complete confusion. (William Davis in The Guardian).

For the average voter, who wanted nothing more than to support a capitalist government, the election came down to a few simple questions.

Did he want a government which said it would build another aircraft carrier or one which said it would not? A government which said it would nationalise steel or one which said it would not? A Prime Minister who said he stood for action not words or one who said that this is a time for decision?

These were the limits of the argument between the Labour and Conservative parties. On the other issues their differences were hardly discernible and in any case both of them naturally reserved the right which all capitalist parties reserve, to change their minds when they are in office.

So the election was really all a massive sham, a choice between two similars. It was also, for anyone who is interested in the welfare of the human race and who realises the potential which lies behind the votes at an election, a terrible, frustrating bore.

Comrades at Arms (1969)

From the May 1969 issue of the Socialist Standard

The communist parties have always had a lot to say about war and peace, but when their words get translated into action they usually mean war.

When the second world war started they were against it, claiming that it was an imperialist war. But after Russia was attacked, all the communist parties of the world were in favour of the war—that is, war against Germany. One would have thought that if the last war was an imperialist war before Russia was attacked it was still an imperialist war after this event, for this act could not affect the nature of the war once it had started.

But of all the past inconsistencies, the latest threat which Russia has given to China—the threat to use nuclear missiles —is surely the most comradely which one so-called communist nation has so far given to the other.

You would have thought that such a diabolical threat, which could blot out half the world and slowly poison the rest, would have needed great provocation. But apparently not so, for the threat concerned a minor border incident in an isolated area — a relative no-man’s-land. The place is the small Damansky island in the Ussuri river which forms part of the boundary between Russia and China. The island is practically barren and is uninhabited. It cannot hope to grow much food and for half the year it is covered with ice.

It used to be stated by Mussolini that his principle was “shoot first and talk afterwards." This measure both Moscow and Peking evidently believe in using. The day after Russia made her threat of nuclear persuasion she asked China what she could do again Russia’s might, for all the world knew that Russia had missiles of deadly accuracy which could pin-point any area and destroy it from a distance. Chairman Mao replied that China could retaliate with nuclear weapons. So now we had two great nuclear imperialists talking business in a language which both understood.

One factor which appears to be behind these border clashes is the undoubted fact that China is developing nuclear weapons at an alarming rate, and it has been stated that in a year China could have missiles with nuclear warheads capable of striking at Moscow from Sinkiang, where their nuclear experiments are taking place.

Another fact which is worrying the Russians is that the official Chinese broadcasts in Russian call upon the Russians, to overthrow the Kremlin ’revisionist clique of imperialists’. Moscow must feel very pleased about this after all they did in the past to assist the Chinese Communists against the Nationalists.

Horace Jarvis

50 Years Ago: Russia versus China (2019)

The 50 Years Ago column from the April 2019 issue of the Socialist Standard

The powers of capitalism can never be frank about the reasons for their international conflicts. That is why the official propaganda machines always represent wars as clashes of ideology — clashes between cruelty and mercy, belligerence and amity, or simply between right and wrong.

This applies as much to those states which claim to be socialist as to the rest. The dispute between Russia and China, for example, is represented by both sides as an ideological clash; the Russians say the Chinese are warmongers, the Chinese accuse Russia of betraying a socialist revolution.

During the fighting last month at Damansky Island, in the Ussuri River, both Russia and China accused the other of ‘armed provocation’. The Russian protest complained of ‘adventuristic policy . . . reckless provocative actions . . .’ The Chinese loudspeakers blared out abuse about the ‘renegade, revisionist clique’ in Moscow.

In fact the fighting started for anything but ideological reasons. The Russian territory around Vladivostok was annexed under the Tsars in the 19th century. The Bolsheviks swore to return the land but that was one of those vows which were quietly forgotten in the rise of capitalism in Russia.

Since then Russia has poured an immense amount of capital into developing the area’s industries and communications. Vladivostok is an important naval base, and Russia’s only commercial outlet to the Pacific. And just like any other capitalist class, the rulers of Russia are anxious to protect their investments.

China, however, as a newly rising capitalist power is pressing to re-negotiate the treaties which lay down her frontiers (the reason, also, for the clashes with India in 1962), one of which is marked by the Ussuri. All of this combined to make a delicate and dangerous situation, which is not in any way lessened by the supposed ideological comradeship between the two states.

It is, in fact, a classical dispute between two capitalist powers. Very often these disputes start over something trivial, like a spit of sand in the Ussuri River. But the background is anything but trivial.

(Socialist Standard, April 1969)

The Ways of Imperialisms (1947)

Editorial from the July 1947 issue of the Socialist Standard

If nature abhors a vacuum so does capitalism; the “vacuum" for this purpose being a weak State with a stronger neighbour, especially if the weak State has within its borders such a valuable prize as uranium deposits needed for the production of atomic weapons. The Chinese Government complains that Sinkiang is being invaded by troops from Outer Mongolia, aided by planes bearing Soviet markings. (The Soviet Government denies this.) According to a Chinese Government spokesman Soviet agents had been discovered before the attack making “unauthorised mineral surveys" in an area where uranium deposits were recently reported (Manchester Guardian, June 13th, 1947), though the explanation given by the Mongolians for the invasion was the arrest of eight of their soldiers.

It all reads like the customary procedure when a powerful State has designs on its neighbours. Outer Mongolia is a Russian puppet state and between 1933 and 1939 Sinkiang too came under Russian influence, "when the province was governed by Sheng Shih-tsai, who won his position with Russian aid after a brief but bloody civil war” (Manchester Guardian, June 16th, 1947). As Sinkiang, though ostensibly part of China, is separated from that country by over a thousand miles of semi-desert and is more easily accessible from Russian-dominated Outer Mongolia, it looks as if Russian expansion is bound to gain the day unless some other major Power, equally interested in uranium, considers it of sufficient importance to take a hand as welL

The people who are least likely to be consulted by any of the Governments concerned are the inhabitants of Sinkiang, who probably only want to be left alone to live their own lives in seclusion, free from interference by China, Russia, or any other Power.

Perhaps, if this position develops further, the puppets of the Russian Foreign Office (foreign Communist parties) might do worse than consult Lenin’s "Imperialism" published by themselves.

About Solzhenitsyn (1974)

Solzhenitsyn with Heinrich Böll in West Germany, 1974

From the April 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

So Solzhenitsyn is now able to voice his views openly. It is possible, for the first time, to see how he measures up to the problems not merely of writers in Russia, but of all mankind. What can this Nobel Prize winner tell us?

Before weighing in with criticisms of his manifesto (Sunday Times, March 3), we must make it clear, first, that we have always opposed all forms of censorship, and secondly, that in criticising his ideas we are in no way defending the Kremlinite creed, to which we have consistently expressed our hostility. But however sympathetic we may be to one who has struggled successfully and has made his views heard in spite of all the Soviet censorship and suppression machine, we cannot applaud his political views.

We should like to have greeted him as a world citizen, an internationalist not a nationalist. But his views are based on an insular patriotism and Russian Orthodox Christianity. He believes in the myth of the “national interest”: indeed he bases his argument against a Russian war with China, not on the view that working-class interests are not at stake, but simply on the calculation that Russia could not win such a war and therefore it would be against Russia’s “national interest”.

Although apparently a fervent Leninist when he started his prison career, he is now a devout believer in Orthodox Christianity. If this is the result of incarceration in those inhuman prisons and labour-camps, it would seem to be an effective practical demonstration of the truth of Marx’s words:

  Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the sentiment of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.

On War and the Environment
In his manifesto Solzhenitsyn argues on two issues of the day. The first is the prospect of a Sino-Soviet war: he proposes that, since in his view ideology is the main cause of friction, the Russian government should abandon its ideology in the “national interest”. He seems to believe that, if this were done, there would be peace with China.

What the author of August 1914 should know is that nowhere can one find evidence of a war being fought solely because of ideology. Dogs may dislike each other’s colour or breed, but when they fight it is over a bone, or a bitch. Humans likewise don’t fight over creeds, but over markets and minerals, ports and provinces.

Solzhenitsyn’s second argument is not original and he names his sources — the Club of Rome and the Teilhard de Chardin Society. He has adopted their doomsday environmentalism, arguing against pollution and skyscraper cities and for a return to 2-storey houses and horse-transport. He sees a no-growth economy as the solution to the problems of mineral shortages, population pressures and pollution.

His argument, like that of other doomsday writers, takes no account of any possible re-structuring of society. Their computers are never programmed to tell us how world Socialism, with production for use not for profit, would employ the earth’s resources. Like the Club of Rome, Solzhenitsyn assumes that production for profit will go on for ever, and then argues that this system must be reformed to prevent it from destroying mankind’s habitat. Better surely to argue for an end to capitalism, since it is a system which generates waste and seeks constantly to increase the quantity of materials processed, year by year.

Solecisms Versus Marx
But when we come to his views on “ideology” it is plain that Solzhenitsyn has no knowledge of what Marxist theory really is. He has accepted the lies of the Kremlinites and so presents us with a distorted caricature of Marxism, a series of Aunt Sallys which he passionately shoots down in flames.

From this great sage, we learn that Marxism, “a primitive, superficial economic theory . . . declared that only the worker creates value and failed to take into account the contribution of either organizers, engineers, transport or market systems.” To start with, he ignores the fact that Marxist theory puts engineers and transport workers in the working class: they all have a living to earn, they all have to sell their labour-power. Also that in reckoning the value of a commodity, we take into account the wear and tear on machinery, the value of all raw materials used in manufacture and also any socially necessary labour time used in research and development (e.g. by engineers, organizers etc.)

The Marxist theory of value asserts simply that human labour is the sole source of value. But there is a lot more to Marxist economic theory than this basic proposition: to start with there are three volumes of Capital, and it is doubtful if even the sage Solzhenitsyn would describe them as “superficial”.

His other attacks on Marxism are similarly wide of the mark. Most of all he goes wrong on the question of revolution. According to him, Marxism “was mistaken through and through in its prediction that socialists could only come to power by an armed uprising.” Evidently Solzhenitsyn’s education in ideology did not include what Engels wrote on this subject:

  The time of surprise attacks, of revolutions carried through by small conscious minorities at the head of unconscious masses, is past.

Indeed Engels argued that for a complete transformation of society to be undertaken successfully, it must be on the basis of full participation and the support of the mass of the community.

Again, according to Solzhenitsyn, Marxism is wrong in stating that the Socialist movement will come to the fore in advanced and highly developed countries first. We have only to use our eyes, to look at countries such as Russia which claimed to be “socialist” and see that this vaunted pseudo-socialism is merely a nasty form of capitalism. In 1917 the S.P.G.B. was pointing to Russia’s backwardness as an indication that the revolution could only bring about an acceleration of capitalist development. Now in 1974 Solzhenitsyn describes how Russian technology has copied Western technology, how pollution increases due to greed for profits and how the people are oppressed by poverty:

  In practice, a man’s wage-level ought to be such that whether he has a family of two or even four children, the woman does not need to earn a separate pay-packet and does not need to support her family financially on top of all her other toils and troubles.

Russia is just as much a capitalist country as America or Britain, Cuba or Kenya. Everywhere the capitalist “mode of production” prevails: we see men and women who possess no land, no tools, nothing, who are driven by fear of want to sell their labour-power by the week or the month, mortgaging their lives in instalments so as to survive till the next pay-day. We see them producing goods galore, “an immense accumulation of commodities”, all their own work, yet they remain unable to afford most of what they need. We see human toil and human skills diverted from man’s real needs — food, clothing, health, housing, culture — to pander to the aristocracy of Big Business, the wasteful war-machine, the accountants, the luxury resorts, and so on.

This is what Marxists oppose: a worldwide system of exploitation of the many by, and for the benefit of, the few. A system which combines wanton waste with wasteful want. Shame it is that Solzhenitsyn has failed to join the movement to end it and has instead sided with those who say that authoritarianism can be made tolerable by reform. He is indeed one of those who “wear their chains with decency”.

Charmian Skelton