First Published:October No 4-5, Summer/Fall 1978
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm and Paul Saba
Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.
In the space of a few months, the Soviet Union has launched an unprecedented offensive in both Africa and Asia. In April, the USSR instigated a coup d’etat in Afghanistan. In May, Soviet-controlled mercenaries invaded Zaire for the second time. In June, the leaders of both Yemens were assassinated, Democratic Kampuchea was invaded by 70,000 Vietnamese soldiers, and the USSR conducted large-scale military manouevres in northern Japan. The intervention in Eritrea and Angola is continuing. And military clashes periodically occur on China’s borders with the Soviet Union and Vietnam.
There can be no comparison between the USSR’s actions of ten years ago and its much more extensive manoeuvers of today. Ten years ago social-imperialism was just emerging and the invasion of Czechoslovakia was its first show of force.
All the Soviet actions are part of its preparations for a new world war. It is engaged in a test of strength with the United States, a contest for the domination of the world, and right now is trying to build up its forces by tearing away strategic positions and spheres of influence from its rival. This is what makes it the most dangerous source of war.
All the Soviet Union’s manoeuvres are part of a well-known organized plan. As Chairman Mao said, “the Soviet Union has wild ambitions. It wants to lay hands on the whole of Europe, Asia and Africa.”
Right now, Europe is the focal point of the rivalry between the USSR and the other superpower, the United States. In other words, the success of the Soviet plan depends on whether or not it can control the main countries of Western Europe.
But in order to conquer Europe, it must gather farces Wherever it can, and weaken its adversaries. This is why it is building up its strength in Africa and the Middle East in order to suffocate its prey, deprive it of strategic resources and cut its maritime links.
Since penetrating Angola in 1975, the USSR has been trying to occupy all of central and southern Africa.
Its repeated attempts to take over Zaire – twice in less than 14 months – show that it wants to break Africa in two along a line from Angola (where it maintains 20,000 Cuban mercenaries) to Ethiopia (where it has 17,000 more). It hopes simultaneously to take over southern Africa through infiltration or open aggression.
Control of the southern half of Africa would give the Soviets control over the strategic shipping lane around the Cape of Good Hope that carries oil from the Middle East to Europe and America. 80% of oil supplies to NATO’s European members and 70% of their imported raw materials take this route.
In Namibia, Azania and Zimbabwe, the USSR is clearly trying to infiltrate the national liberation movements. In Angola this tactic was crowned with success. The USSR succeeded in infiltrating one of the three liberation movements in the country, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). Combining open aggression with infiltration, the USSR then took over the country with the help of its Cuban “foreign legion.
The USSR also has its eye on southern Africa’s abundance of raw materials. For example, Zaire produces 1/4 of the world’s industrial diamonds, and is a great source of copper and cobalt; Azania produces 70% of the world’s gold and is number one in diamond production; Tanzania and Angola too have abundant supplies of diamonds, and Angola also produces oil.
On June 24, 1978 a bomb killed the President of North Yemen in the Middle East. On the 26th a pro-Soviet coup d’etat overthrew and killed the president of South Yemen, Ali Hobaye Salem. On the 28th, 500 Cuban reinforcements landed in Aden, the capital. This lightening quick series of events reminded the world that the USSR is more anxious than ever to get its hands on this strategic region.
The Middle East means oil: more than a third of world oil production originates there (the two superpowers together produce another third). Since Western Europe produces very little oil, it imports most of its needs from the Middle East. The US also imports a certain amount from this region.
Control over the sources of oil is key to waging a war in Europe. At the present time they are firmly in the hands of US imperialism, but the USSR is using every trick in the hook to get hold of them.
For example, it has flooded the area with a great deal of “disinterested aid”. Between 1956 and 1972, the Soviets pumped 40 % of their economic “aid” to the third world into the Middle East. As for military “aid” in the same period, the figure topped 55%!
At the present time, the Soviets are closely watching the Israeli-Arab conflict and attempting to take advantage of it. American diplomacy and the Camp David peace talks between Sadat (Egypt) and Begin (Israel) had squeezed them out of the picture. But now they are planning a comeback by taking advantage of the struggle against American domination waged by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and countries like Algeria and Libya. While the wolf is being kicked out the front door, the Soviet tiger would like to grab the opportunity to sneak in the back.
On September 20, 1978 the PLO and four Arab countries (Syria, Algeria, South Yemen and Libya) denounced the traitorous Camp David agreements but called for stronger ties with Moscow. This is a clear victory for Soviet diplomacy.
The Middle East is also a strategic region from a military point of view. It links three continents, Africa, Asia and Europe, and serves as a bridge between the USSR and Europe’s southern flank.
Last June 23, the USSR signed a “Friendship and Cooperation” Treaty with Turkey. This was an important breakthrough, because Turkey is closely tied to US imperialism. The country is a member of NATO arid recently reopened American bases on the Black Sea.
Among other things, the treaty provides far a commercial agreement in the near future that will multiply economic exchanges between the two countries by two to two and half times in just three years. But that’s not all. The USSR and its East European allies have accumulated more investments in Turkey in the last ten years than the US has in 30.
Economic penetration isn’t the only thing the Soviets are interested in in Turkey. Turkish territory is on both sides of the narrow passage linking the Black Sea to the Mediterranean; the Black Sea contains important Soviet naval bases, and the Mediterranean is the site for 36% of Soviet naval manoeuvres in the world. Clearly the USSR would prefer that the passage be controlled by a “friendly– and “cooperative” country.
Socialist China is a major obstacle to the Soviet revisionists’ war plans. China is leading the building of the world united front against the criminal activities of the two superpOwers, especially those of the Soviet Union.
One day the Soviet Union intends to go further than violent statements and border clashes with China such as occured in May 1978.
That’s why it set up a new pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan, to the west, on April 27. Within three months, 500 Soviet “advisors” had been placed in almost all government departments, and 25 economic: and technical agreements had been signed between Afghanistan and the USSR.
In Southeast Asia, the USSR hopes to turn Vietnam into an Asian Cuba. It stands to gain a lot. The Vietnamese army, having defeated the American aggressors, is among the best-equipped in the world. And, like Cuba, Vietnam has great prestige among the peoples of the world because of its victory over the United States.
Soviet control of Vietnam also means a secure base for their Pacific fleet. Russian flags have replaced American ones in the ports of Da Nang and Cam Bank Soviet ships can more easily threaten the Chinese coast and South Pacific sea lanes. Island nations like Japan, Indonesia and the Philippines depend on these routes.
Behind the present tension in Southeast Asia we find the Soviet Union. It is the Soviets who have encouraged the Vietnamese authorities to poison relations between China and Vietnam by expelling 160,000 overseas Chinese.
They are the ones who are fueling the Vietnamese leaders’ desire for local hegemony. For some time now these leaders have made desperate attempts to invade Kampuchea, a new socialist country, to overthrow the revolutionary regime and install their own puppets. The Kampuchean leaders have proven that Soviet officers and military advisors have taken part in this aggression.
In the east, the Soviet revisionists are building a new naval base at Korsakan. In June, 1978, they organized large-scale military manoeuvres near four northern Japanese islands which they illegally occupy.
Finally, on the diplomatic level, the USSR is trying to penetrate ASEAN, the Association of South-East Asian Nations, which comprises Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore.
The Soviet revisionists have not given up the idea of invading China; they have no less than 400,000 troops stationed along its northern borders. But if they decide to attack, they will be committing a fatal error.
The Soviet Union has concentrated its attacks on the Middle East and Africa. Why there? To improve its military position in relation to Europe. Thus, the USSR will be able to crush Europe by cutting it off from the raw materials it draws from these regions.
Europe is the focal point of the rivalry between the two superpowers. The superpower to get its hands on this continent will have a decisive edge over the other.
Remember that the nine countries of the European Common Market, which is just a bit bigger than Ontario, have a bigger population than either the US or the USSR, that is 260 million. The ECM’s Gross National Product is superior to the USSR’s and its steel and nuclear power production is greater than that of either the US or the USSR. There are millions of qualified workers and great industrial and scientific centres. The Soviet bear would like to get its paws on such a delicious morsel!
At the present time, however, the Soviet Union is not powerful enough to be sure of taking over Western Europe. The two superpowers are confronting each other but there is no possibility for a quick and decisive breakthrough. So Moscow wants to strengthen its positions in Africa and Asia before attacking Europe.
The Soviet Union has developed three new tactics in its recent offensive. Firstly, use countries it controls, like Cuba and Vietnam, in armed aggression against third-world countries. Secondly, turn Africans’ against Africans (as in Angola and the Horn of Africa) and Asians against Asians (as in Southeast Asia). Thirdly, make use of pro-Soviet individuals or forces inside third-world countries.
Many progressive and sincerely anti-imperialist people see all of this, but are not convinced of the threat the USSR holds for the worlds’ peoples. And revisionist propaganda, after all, spares no efforts in presenting Soviet expansionism in a positive light.
A recent edition of the Soviet weekly New Times, for example, made the following justification of the Cuban/Soviet intervention in Africa: the Soviet Union “exerts every effort to support the just cause of the liberation or peoples from racist and colonial oppression, of the defence of sovereignty and territorial integrity of countries from encroachment from without. In doing so it seeks no advantage for itself, covets no concessions, does not strive to establish its political domination or to set up military bases; it does not interfere in the internal affairs of the African countries.” (no. 27, p. 1, July, 1978)
No concessions, no advantage for itself? Then how to explain the fact that the USSR bought sheet steel in Egypt from 1971 to 1974 for between 109 and 135 rubles per ton, and, during the same years, sold it to India, Syria and Iran at between 124 and 171 rubles per ton? How is it that the USSR bought its coffee front Angola at only 38% of the world price after its aggression in that country?
No striving for political domination? What about Angola and Ethiopia? There are 40,000 Cuban troops and thousands of Soviet “advisors” in the two countries. The regimes are literally kept in place by Moscow and its agents. They know very well that they can’t survive without this.
No military bases? Egypt has revealed that in 1967 Soviet leader Podgorny demanded a base in the port of Alexandria, on the Mediterranean. But not just any base! He wanted to establish a command post and shipyard, all to be guarded exclusively by the Russian navy. He wanted “the whole area – the commanding centre, the shipyard and the living quarters for the guards – to be put at the disposal of the Russians (and) the Soviet flag he raised in the area.” (Quoted in Third World Unity, no. 9, September, 1978, p.31) The Soviets have many other bases on the continent. Presently they are building two in Angola, at Porto Aboim and at Lobito.
No interference in the internal affairs of African countries? There is certainly no lack of examples showing the contrary: take the invasion of Angola or Zaire, the intervention in Ethiopia, the attempts to tighten their hold over Egypt and Somalia through “friendship” treaties or the attempted coup d’etat in the Sudan...
The Soviet Union uses every opportunity to divide African countries in two categories: “reactionary” countries and “progressive” countries. The one and only criteria is the country’s attitude towards Moscow. For instance Ethiopia is considered to he a “progressive” and even “revolutionary” country although the fascist Merigistu regime has executed thousands of opponents and done its utmost to crush the Eritrean people’s struggle against national oppression.
None of this has anything to do with “the just cause of peoples’ liberation” trumpeted by Soviet propaganda or with “proletarian internationalism” or “socialist aid”.
For good reason! There is no longer anything socialist about the Soviet Union. In 1956, a clique led by Khrushchev betrayed Marxism-Leninism and the Soviet working class and took power. By restoring capitalism, the clique changed the country from top to bottom, transforming it into a new imperialist power. Within the country, capitalist exploitation and fascist oppression of the people of all nationalities became the rule.
To get out of the internal crisis rocking the country, the Soviet bourgeoisie must conquer outside markets and export capital. That means an inevitable collision with the other imperialists, especially American imperialism that dominates the western world and a good part of the third world.
This struggle to redivide the world will eventually lead to war. This is an objective law independant of man’s will. As long as imperialism exists, it will always try to violently conquer the peoples and countries of the world.
The imperialist war must and can he put off. Why? Because the peoples of the world, Marxist-Leninists and the socialist countries don’t want anything to do with this war in which the masses will he used as cannon fodder for the exploiters. How? By isolating the two superpowers and by forming a broad united front against their hegemony.
This is possible because the two superpowers are not invincible, far from it!
In 1956 Chairman Mao said of American imperialism (social imperialism wasn’t born yet):
Now US imperialism is quite powerful, but in reality it isn’t. It is very weak politically because it is divorced from the masses of the people and is disliked by everybody and by American people too. In appearance it is very powerful but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of, it is a paper tiger! (American Imperialism is a Paper Tiger in Selected Works Volume V, p. 310).
The same goes for the USSR today. As comrade Mao Tsetung said, “in its offensive lies defeat”. (Chairman Mao’s Theory of the Differentiation of the Three Worlds is a Major Contribution to Marxism-Leninism, p. 68)
Internally the USSR is racked by a hundred and one difficulties. It failed to reach the economic goals set in its last five-year plan (1971-1975). Consumer goods are rare because production is geared to the war machine, and agriculture is stagnating. Fascist repression is the rule and the country has been transformed into a new “prisonhouse of nationalities”. as it was under the old czars.
Furthermore, discontent is rampant and outbursts of anger now occur at regular intervals. According to recent information that leaked out despite Soviet censorship, demonstrations and strikes have broken out in Thilissi, Chinikent, Kharkov, Kaunas, Tallin, Minsk, Leningrad and Novosibirsk. This year, an important demonstration in Georgia forced the authorities to drop a proposed new constitution that would have accelerated the forced assimilation of the Georgian nationality. The dissidents’ movement, which is demanding democratic rights, and the setting up of free unions is snowballing. The revisionist clique in power is hated by the Soviet people. This is its fundamental weakness.
The United States is also up to its neck in problems, especially since its devastating defeat in Southeast Asia. Vast popular movements are sweeping Nicaragua and Iran for example, and they are clearly aimed at the United Slates.
Inside the United States, a deep economic crisis is dragging on and the revolt of the working class, the people and oppressed nationalities is building. Sooner or later this movement will deal the final blow to US imperialism.
Communists are against all imperialist war. This is why we oppose the policy of confrontation pushed by large sectors of the imperialist bourgeoisie.
We want international peace to last the longest time possible so that the outbreak of a new world war is put off as much as possible.
In order to succeed, we must accomplish certain tasks. We have to counter Soviet demagogy on “detente”; we must counter the tactic pushed by some western capitalists of appeasing the USSR, and finally, we must disrupt the strategic plans of the superpowers, especially the USSR.
The USSR makes great use of demagogy on detente, to make people believe that the normal development of the situation is towards peace and disarmament. This is an illusion. In actual fact, there has never been long-term detente, and the arms race between the two superpowers has never been so fierce as it is today. What is the purpose of this lie? To dupe the people and then take them by surprise.
What about the tactic of appeasement? This is proposed by some groups of capitalists who think that they can abate the Soviet appetite by making concessions, for example by recognizing Soviet zones of influence (the Sonnenfeldt Doctrine that sanctioned Soviet domination over the countries of Eastern Europe is a case in point), by supplying it with technology or with loans, or by participating in treaties and all sorts of conferences (like the Helsinki Conference on European security).
The preachers of appeasement think that one day the USSR on its own will stop its continuous push for more, and thus the danger of a war will disappear. This is a mistake from beginning to end. Experience shows that if we abandon a morsel to social-imperialism it will just go after more later. After Angola in 1975, the USSR struck Ethiopia and then twice in Zaire.
We are against this tactic. It does not put off war, it just brings it closer. And it also dulls the peoples’ vigilance.
We must therefore disrupt and work against the superpowers’ strategic plans. The essential means to achieve this is to build a united front of all peoples and countries possible, against begemonism.
This united front is already building before our very eyes. Everywhere, peoples and countries are standing up to the USSR.
In Africa, social-imperialism is running into a brick wall. In the Horn of Africa the Eritrean liberation fighters are successfully resisting the reactionary Ethiopian leaders’ frantic assaults. The Ethiopian regime is supported by the USSR, which supplies it with heavy arms and planes.
The revolutionary forces in Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) and Azania (South Africa) have learned from Angola’s experience and have no intention of falling into the trap of Russian “aid”. “The people of Zimbabwe are facing threats from both western imperialism and social-imperialism, and the menace from social-imperialism, in particular more insidious and dangerous. However, the people of Zimbabwe are not afraid we are bold enough and ideologically prepared to deal with them.” (Robert Mugabe, President of Zanu, Zimbabwe African National Union, quoted in The Forge, VoI. 2, no. 14, p. 12)
In Zaire, a second invasion by Soviet mercenaries, the ex-“Katangan gendarmes”, was a miserable failure.
In a great show of courage, Somalia threw out the Soviet Union and Cuba November 15, 1977 and denounced the “friendship treaty” that tied Somalia to the USSR. The Soviet base at Berbera was closed and thousands of Soviet and Cuban experts were expelled. Thus the USSR lost an important base of support in Africa.
Many people in other African countries have begun to expose the Soviet Union’s treacherous designs. The Kenyan magazine, Weekly Review, made this evaluation of Soviet “aid” in its August, 1978 issue: “Their aid consists of minimum technical training for the local workers. They keep secret their blueprints and plans, and they refuse to permit anyone but their own technicians to operate and in some cases, even to see – the more complicated machinery,. What the Russians demand in return for their aid amounts to exploitation and diminished independence. (quoted in Peking Review, no 33, 1978, p. 36)
Finally, the Soviet Union’s attempts to divide the Organization of African Unity (OAU – composed of most of the African countries) during its 15th summit conference in the summer of 1978 met with failure.
Things aren’t going too well for the Russian bear in Asia either.
Vietnam’s repeated aggression against Kampuchea has failed, despite the strength of the aggressor and Russian assistance. The Communist Party of Kampuchea is firmly in control of the leadership and of socialist construction of the country.
In Thailand and the Philippines, armed struggle is being waged under the leadership of Marxist-Leninist parties. This is a thorn in the side of not just US imperialism, but social-imperialism also. That’s why the Soviets forced Vietnam to cut all aid to the Thai and Philippine communists, whom it had previously helped.
But confident of the future, the leader of the Communist Party of the Philippines, Anradri Guerrero, wrote a few years ago: “Like US imperialism, Soviet social-imperialism is over extending itself. As it overstretches, its crisis at home will inevitably worsen. It is sitting on a volcano... Social-imperialism is nothing but a passing phrase in the downward course of imperialism.”
In Europe too, social-imperialism is confronted with ever-greater resistance.
In October, 1977 in East Berlin, a thousand youths spontaneously demonstrated to denounce the Soviet military occupation. In Poland the people have risen up on several occasions. Remember the great mass struggles that occured in June, 1976. Other strikes took place in August and September 1977 to protest high prices.
On the international scene, the unity of non-aligned countries held strong at the July, 1978 Belgrade conference. The USSR used Cuba and Vietnam to try to divide the movement. But the movement kept its anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist and anti-hegemonic stance.
Marxist-Leninist parties and the socialist countries are playing, a leading role in building the united front against hegemonism.
Socialist China is doing everything it can to bring all positive factors into play in the struggle against the superpowers.
The signing of a peace and friendship treaty between China and Japan, August 12, was a blow against the Soviet revisionists. A clause denouncing hegemonism was included: “The Contracting Parties declare that neither of them should seek hegemony... and that each is opposed to efforts by any other country... to establish such hegemony.(Quoted in Peking Review, no. 33, 1978, p. 8)
There are more than 150 countries in the world, but the USSR was the only one to feel singled out, even though it wasn’t mentioned by name! The Soviet leaders moved heaven and earth to intimidate Japan, including large-scale military manoeuvres in the northern Japanese islands.
Chinese Chairman Hua Kuo-feng’s trip to Romania, Yugoslavia and Iran in August 1978 was also a great victory against Soviet hegemonism.
Romania and Yugoslavia are both in Eastern Europe the Soviet Union considers to be its own backyard. Despite heavy pressure from their powerful neighbour these two countries maintain a national independence policy that is clearly positive. Comrade Hua was welcomed by over 600,000 people, helped to strengthen their bonds in the common fight against hegemonism.
Chairman Hua’s stop-over in Iran helped to strengthen the friendship between Iran and China. This is also a positive thing which helps to counter the USSR’s aggressive plans. The Soviet Union shares 1700-km long border with Iran and would like to get its hands on the oil-rich country (Iran is the 4th biggest oil-producer in the world).
Outraged by this visit right under their nose, Brezhinev and company screamed and hollered that this was a threat to peace, and so on. But their accusations couldn’t be farther from the truth. In fact, it is the superpowers which pose the major threat to peace. And the threat would be all the more dangerous if all the countries neighbouring the Soviet Union obediently followed Soviet dictates. On the other hand standing up to Soviet expansionist manoeuvres disorganizes its plans and puts off the war.
In Europe and in the very heart of the American superpower Marxist-Leninist parties and organizations are in the forefront of the fight against the superpowers, especially social-imperialism. Lately, Marxist-Leninists in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Belgium, etc, organized or played a leading role in demonstrations marking the 10th anniversary of the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the new czars. They are simultaneously leading the fight for socialism and preparing the peoples for war.
As Pal Steigan, Chairman of the Workers’ Communist Party of Norway (Marxist-Leninist) (AKP(ML)), said “The new czars are undoubtedly making plans for a future invasion of Norway (...) The Norwegian people have witnessed five years of Nazi occupation and will never allow any aggressor to become their master. We rely on the correctness of the Party’s line, on the patriotic Norwegian people and on the international support of all freedom-loving peoples of the world including the people of the USA. We will never be intimidated.” (Speech given at the first anniversary of the Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist CP(ML) in the United States, quoted in Class Struggle, theoretical review of CP(ML)).
As a part of its internationalist tasks in Canada, the League has set out to develop the struggle of the Canadian people against the two superpowers and the war danger.
While fighting American domination in our country we must also heighten the people’s vigilance towards social-imperialism. When the radioactive spy satellite crashed in the Northwest Territories in January 1978, the League was the only political force to denounce the USSR. It was also the only political force to denounce the presence of a Soviet military observation post on an island in the Canadian Arctic.
We will continue this struggle.
We must look to the future with confidence. No matter how terrifying they seem, the two superpowers will meet defeat. The future doesn’t belong to them, it belongs to the people. “They have done so many foul and evil things,” said Chairman Mao, “that the revolutionary people the world over will not let them go unpunished. The people of all countries are rising. A new historic period of struggle against US imperialism and Soviet revisionism has begun.” (Chairman Mao’s Theory of the Differentiation of the Three Worlds is a Major Contribution to Marxism-Leninism, p. 73)
Hated by all, the American eagle has no hope of surviving the battle with the people of the world.
The same goes for the Soviet bear. As long as we unite the Canadian people with all other people, support all the just struggles waged against it and work to build a world united front, it too will perish.
Recently the Party of Labour of Albania has been launching attacks and spreading unspeakable lies against socialist China, its internal and foreign policies, and Chairman Mao’s theory of three worlds.
At the same time, it has kindly refrained from commenting on the counter-revolutionary strategy of subversion and aggression being carried out by the USSR.
For the Soviet revisionists the diversion is welcome. The PLA takes the spotlight off them and maligns China, which is building a united front against hegemonism. As a matter of fact, the PLA’s attacks on China (echoed in Canada by the “CPCML”-In Struggle-Bolshevik Union trio) have reached such an hysterical pitch that now it is saying that it is socialist China and not the superpowers which is attacking the world’s peoples and beating the war-drums all over the world!
Zeri i Popullit, central organ of the PLA, fired off yet another volley of anti-China slander September 3. It accuses China of having “the typically imperialist policy of a superpower, a bellicose (warlike) policy for world domination,” (our translation from the French).
ZIP maintains that China is even hoping that the superpowers will destroy each other in a battle fought on the backs of the European peoples so that it can then take over the continent : “China will be busy modernizing itself up to the year 2000. In the meantime let Europe’s superpowers fight one another, let the European peoples he burned and massacred by atomic bombs, and let neutron radiation wipe out men. After this apocalypse, in the twenty years left to this century, China will have finished “modernizing” itself. It will have become a superpower and can then take control of the world without having fired a shot!”
Reality thoroughly contradicts this delirious tirade. Who is robbing the European peoples today after having poured in billions in capital investment? Who has many European countries in its economic and political grip? Who has millions of its soldiers stationed in Europe? The two imperialist superpowers, and certainly not socialist China!
Marxism teaches us to seek truth from facts, not in our imagination.
And to further insinuate that China’s socialist modernization is tantamount to capitalist and imperialist restoration is the same kind of absurdity the “gang of four” pushed in order to sabotage the socialist economy.
These unprincipled charges coincide with those the USSR spouts daily to camouflage its own expansionism. The Albanian leadership’s activity can only have the same results – hide Soviet aggression and present the victim as the aggressor.
For instance, Soviet propaganda “draws attention to the serious danger represented by Peking’s hegemonistic great-power policy supported by the reactionary quarters of the West” (in the Soviet magazine, New Times, no 37, p.1). This is word for word what the PLA is presently saying.
The Soviet and Albanian positions are identical on several other questions as well.
For example, this is what the Soviet Union thinks of the Sino-Japanese Treaty of Peace and Friendship: “The Japanese-Chinese ’peace and friendship treaty’ can clearly be regarded as a serious step towards the realization of Peking’s plans for the establishment of an international anti-socialist front...” And the treaty’s anti-hegernonism clause “is in effect an attempt to harness Japan to the Chinese social chauvinists’ bellicose great-power strategy” (New Times, no 36, p. 12).
ZIP goes further. It states overtly: “The fact that the Chinese leadership and its partners give an anti-social-imperialist tone to this treaty, itself incites world war.” This really takes the cake. Isn’t it the USSR which is militarily occupying four northern Japanese islands, refusing to return them, and which is even engaged in major military manoeuvres to intimidate japan?
Here’s another example: the Soviet Union is sowing trouble in southeast Asia, using Vietnam, its new “Asian Cuba,” to attack socialist China and Kampuchea. Naturally, Soviet propaganda puts all the blame on China. “Peking’s policy towards the Socialist Republic of Vietnam has undergone a negative evolution prompted by o the great-power hegemonic designs of the Chinese leaders. The Peking authorities seek to achieve their expansionist aims through the agency of others, in the given instance by making Kampuchea an instrument of aggression. Kampuchea is regarded by Peking as a sort of testing ground for its political and military concepts and plans.” (New Times, no 37, p. 20).
Echoing New Times, here is what ZIP has to say: “The Chinese leadership in its expansionist and hegemonic designs, has stirred up the Cambodian-Vietnamese conflict” because “China is pursuing an imperialist policy with regards to Vietnam.” This is indeed standing the world on its head. The Soviet Union has thousands of troops in Vietnam, Vietnam attacks Kampuchea in order to swallow it up, and yet China, which has never attacked another country, is supposedly the aggressor!
It’s obvious that all of social-imperialism’s hollering about China is meant only to hide its own intentions. China is standing. up to it and warning all the peoples of the world about its danger. China is putting great effort into building a world united front against the superpowerS, and in particular against Soviet social-imperialism, which is on the offensive.
The plans of the PLA leaders will fail. They will not succeed in drawing attention away from social-imperialism, nor in sowing confusion among the world’s peoples or the international communist movement. Only an isolated clique of splittists has so far followed their example. The revolutionary peoples are able to distinguish friends, among whom China occupies the primary position, from, enemies, the superpowers and the USSR in particular.