Indochinese regimes?
Lnos and Cambodia must rank as the most brutal attack ever to be unleashed by an imperials power against presser people. For a decade and a half the cation in the world used Indochinese peninsula as a labora pina desperase bid to stem the tide used almost every weapon short of nuclear missiles and bomhs. They PETE BAYO out they left Indochina devas ated: mass destruction of fore use of oxic chemicals in paddy elda, saturation bombing of a the major ndustrial centres i Northern Vietnam They engaged in large-scale massacres of the civilian populations. The My Lai the best publicised, but there were many others.
Enrouthout the par the mos slavishdefendersof American war policies in this country were the Labour Rovernment. Die Famo mist, the bulk of the news media (more servile than the Americar press and a variety of intellectus Ightweights them Singaley Amis and Wilson as Prime Minister said that be did not think the My La nassacre had taken placel wi um Rees-Moer of The Time icked Nixon's arse so diligently that be delended the White House crook during the carly stages of Yatergare These Tactsse the context for the present campaign against Viet nam and Cambodia. It is part of the ideological campaign of the ruling rule the pro ge and neer class 1o and necover Indochinese war and the Watergatecrisis.
More to the point its inteation is to prepare the public for direct US interventions elsewbere. Southern ANCELODEL SUCH HELE The book which is being used to unleash this campaign was pub ished in the United Stares under Marcer Dr a Centie Land. It has been reprinted in country by Hodder and Stoughton under the title Peace with Horror The latest media convertto Barror and Paul'shorrarstories is Marlin Woolacoltal The Cuordian. Ho without The two whor Woniacott Taik to ser hat Barron aad Paul virtually IgHOre SEC tole of the United States. The B-32 raids, Ine system atic destruction of the couury are not considered important.
They openly acknowledge tle partisan character of their "diverse some or intormation: intorLast week saw the much-publicised publication of Peace with Horror, an investigation into atrocities in Cambodia. Many of the mal brietings from specialists at the State and Defence Demari the National Securky Council and three foreign emba SESHE WASHION SISTER urprising as the journal for which Barron and Paul originally wrote liberation strugales: the Readers Digest!
One of the better debunking operations onthe Barronand Pau rubbish has been American radical-liberal The Nation. A lengthy the atrocicy literature by Noam Chomskyand Edward S. Herman demoliahes the press campaign 80d the more They cite in example of carried out by the Washington Post.
believed to be the fist of believed to foreed labour conditions in the countryside of Cambodia [to] havereached tbe West." (The pictures show armed sol dier! guarding people plows, others working fields, and the if this man was killed", the captionreads.] But there is & slicht problem The Washingron Post account of how they were smuggled our by a entirely fanciful, The pictures hal the appeared a year earlier in France. Germany and Australia, in the Hamekok Posr [19 April Lon Not troops displaying humane treatmant of Khmer Rouge prisoner.
1976), with the caption True of In fact, an attempt by & Tha trader to sell these photos to the Bangkok Posr was turned down "because the origin and authen ticity of the photographs were in shed them, explaining carried by the weekly 'Khiner watchers" were dubious revien of uhout the ciothes and manner of interesting 'photographs actual pulling всесторо , as well ar NO because FORCED Let an CALECHIC Cambodian regime.
NO The photos appeared in of'urban repression.
Post-revolutionary he education in Vietnam "other observers' who "pointed to the possibility that the series of Thailand with the prime objective of destroying the image of the Socialist parties" before the Stration.
COMPLACENCY Having said all this we ourselves MUEL MOTOS ME BOODL сгар. Because imperialists tell lie:
confused journalists peddle State Department prope WATCIS To bocome ogists of Phoom Pech or Hanci, not to mention Pyongvang and Tirana, cantor be a serious option For anyrevolutionary Marxial. We truths, however unpleasant they EVACUATIONS chu the case of Camhocia While teres alte dons that the press stories are exag gerated and in some cases outright les of the once Band socilsis have to confront the followin facts: there have been limite a purge (whose cxact magnitude is stunkbown withat the Cabbo dian leadership; a forped evacuntion of Phoom Penh was organised; the self-imposed isolation of the Cambodian regime has lod to "SCHUL matsonalist It is pointiess lo deny these facts 'Socialists" who used to ardently defend Sihanouk in this country gour ally every action of tal are now defending with JUSTIFICATION To move populations without their consent cannot be rustitied masses If anything it is an indictipent of the planning models of the regime quality in all colonial cities, but socialists do not deal with that by They plan a different solution. could supceed in Cambodia.
The problems lacco the Vietnamese communists are of an even greater magnitade and ye for and even demanding aid for . They The had relie of te Miesence in has years of experience problems of war and adminis.
Last Julyameeting of the party's Central Committee admitted that the leadership had made gigantic miscakes' in a draft resplution on sive food shorlages. They explain ed it in terms of technica! hack They dismissed tbe Ministerof Agricuitureto indicate theseriousness of the problem.
But despite the infinitely superior political and economi policies of the Vietnamese leaderThin, the country Is sul run or commandist lines. We can express the contradiction inberent in the situation in the following way: the populations of Hue and Saigan ind other cities had access to more intonation wower the Beavily censored pressor the Thieu regime than they do today.
The new Government has established a total monopoly of infornation. It is worth recalling the Lenin and his contrades did ne institute such a monopoly during the civil war in the Soviet Unior Provda, Izvestie and other papers carried debates and discussicins. They printed criticisms.
One of the problems of the new revolutionary regime created. Its credibility, its fune toning and its support sould treble if it instituted a workers real elections to new, democratic insritutions and it lifted its mono KEN ME DOHER ARE ATED In this way the politicisorion of thi would be increased a Aner at une programne wou which the NIF fought and wo was not just national indeper Tree general clections to elect the National Assembly in a really with the principle of universal equal, direct suffrage and secret enforce broad democratic free dom of the press and publication trade union freedom, freedom 1c form political parties, freedom of tion. That is what the Politica Programme of the NLF stated unambienously m. 1907 suhsequently re-stated. It has no beenapplied Here the Stalinist origins idealagical training of the Viet валья Communists win out What experichoe bas shown in Vietnam as in China before it no parties which break with Stalinism (in the sense of disregarding the immediate interests of the While this tends to be under played during the revolutionary the seizure of power itself. All the talk about "democracy turns our to he a subcerfuge. a manoeuvre which we are lold was necessary for that particular stage.
And yer the future of these revo lutions is intimately bound up with the question of tainly but democracy nonetheless Thelack of democracy distorts the lution even the enlightened and benevolent imperialism with one of is trum SOMETIME COVECU cards:
Socialists in the West therefore have an internarionalist duty to pointebese things out to comrade past. Not to do so would be hoth WELL WOLAL COLL SOROBESEE HE LI irresponsible and dishonest.
ALBANIA: East Europcar SOurces cinim thar ibe regime has Jailed thousands of pro-Chinese Albanians afler the party leadership's recent rit with Peking.
USA: A judge who freed young rapist in Madison. Wis venan lawyer in a specia lection calle after an uproar among local citizens. The judge had clairsed that the youch was only reacting "normally" to the PortIsse 3000)
Junior leaders have called a gener strike for this weck, calling for a lifling of the state of siege, ar extended bonas scheme and higher wages FRANCE: A review of The Ans sed Democratic France, a Cooki CP Isader Jear Marrane, in Le Moede, praises it for in Gaullist tong c. Thi review is by Generil Georges Buis.
FRANCE: The former mayor 'Humanite complaining of the import ol 2000 Soviet l'Hismanite. This was quickl ollowed up by his Communis Party successor who denoun ced 'af imports of hunting wherever they fram"
BASQUE COUNTRY: Migue Angel Apalasegal, the Basque nationalist wanted by the Spon ish police and held in France been given provisiona iberty after campaign for his both sides of the Parences CHILE: 60 people picketed the LOS IREWERSE ENECTAT protest at the continued sale of Chilean foodstafts. The picket darity Campaign, bad the sup of the ING, SWP, VC port and the major Chilean parties pendent militants. There will be a picket of Tesco in Gateshead Saturday 17 Septembe from 12 noon to 2pm.
SOCIALIST CHALLENGE 15 September 1977 Page 12
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WILSON AND MY LAI
DIGESTED HISTORY
the book's findings are fabricated nonsense, argues TARIO ALI, but can socialists so easily dismiss the charges against the
another Thai newspaper two days «The Reekok Part then publi
COMMANDIST STRUCTURES
WORKERS RIGHTS
self. is
REVOLUTION AND DEMOCRACY