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- FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
ENGLISH - LANGUAGE EDITION OF THE THEORETICAL ORGAN OF THE
INTERNATIONALEXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
TWO CRISES
Number 4
Editorial
Since July the international situation has been marked by two not yet resolved crises: in the Middle East and in the Straits of Formosa. In both cases, the world has been brought once more "to the brink of the abyss" — a situation which apparently is finding other fanciers beside Foster Dulles.
Khrushchev and Mao also seem to have got a taste for vertigo.
Dangerous games, these, that for days and weeks on end had everyone holding his breath, with peace visibly at the mercy of a single miscalculated step, of an initiative taken by any commander whatsoever of a squadron of planes or of a battery of artillery with "tactical-atomic" ammunition.
Both the crisis of the Middle East and that of the Straits of Formosa have taken on a more explosive character than ever, whose meaning should be grasped.
The new crisis in the Middle East burst out as a result of the Iraq revolution that overthrew the regime of Nouri Sa'id, "the Englishman," as the Arabs called this peerless prison-warder of imperialism in that region. It occurred right in the middle of the civil war in Lebanon, which was threatening imperialism with the loss of that other Middle-Eastern bulwark, and which was already producing the gravest worries in Washington, as well as in London and Paris.
Plans already drawn up for imperialist intervention in Lebanon were, as a result of the Iraq revolution, hastily put into application in an atmosphere of visible nervousness if not of just plain panic.
It seemed as if all the imperialist positions in the Middle East were about to be swept away by the hurricane of the Arab revolution. The movements of the US Sixth Fleet, and the landing in Lebanon of marines armed with tactical atomic weapons demonstrated American imperialism's intention of fighting, including by outright war, against such a development.
Autumn 1958
Next came the Kremlin's warning, in the form of an ultimatum, that any intervention in Iraq or any attack against the United Arab Republic would unleash a counter-attack by the USSR - which caused the marines to remain within Lebanon and the English parachutists within Jordan, and all idea of intervention in Iraq to be abandoned.
Thus finally imperialism's intervention in the Middle East was kept within limits by the establishment of a de facto united front between the forces of the workers' states and the forces of the Arab revolution.
Imperialism has found a partial compensation for its blighted hopes in the fact that the leadership of the Arab revolution still remains in the hands of the bourgeoisie, which is handling the economic positions of imperialism gingerly, and which by its very nature cannot push very far its alliance with the Kremlin, whose influence over the Arab peasant and worker masses it fears.
It remains none the less true tnat when the trialbalance of this new Middle-Eastern crisis is struck as of today, it shows : the removal of Irag from imperialism's control and a blow given to the Baghdad Pact ; the neutralization of Lebanon; the extreme weakening of Jordan (whose Bedouin king hangs on thanks only to a protective cordon of British parachutists around his palace) ; and a new and important stimulus given to the process of unification of the Arab world, perceptible even in the super-rich protectorates of the Persian Gulf
Such a balance-sheet foreshadows new explosions in the Middle East resulting from the withdrawal of the Anglo-American troops forced upon imperialism, from the precarious nature of the Lebanese and even more so of the Jordanian regimes, from the repercussions that their fall would cause, and from the development. of the Iraq revolution.
In addition, to the extent that a new relationship of forces is after all established between imperialism and the national bourgeoisies of these countries, this relationship will sooner or later find its expression, including in a transformation of the terms of the contracts regulating the exploitation of oil, to the increasing disadvantage of imperialism.
On the other hand, the internal difficulties of the Arab revolution can operate in the direction either of facilitating these explosions or of delaying them for a certain time. These difficulties arise from the fact that the present bourgeois and petty-bourgeois leaderships of the Arab revolution are more and more involved in the social and political problems raised by the very victories of the revolution. Outstanding among these problems at the present stage are: the structure and viability of a federative Arab Republic ; agrarian reform ; the industrialization and economic development of the Arab countries formally liberating themselves from imperialism.
The U AR, which already has difficulties with its Syrian province, seems to be handicapped in including other countries, such as Iraq for example, which is more inclined than itself to social reforms, and which is rich as a result of its oil.
Only a strong authority capable of expropriating the feudalists, of breaking the centrifugal tendencies that here and there defend individual interests and privileges, of developing in this way the internal market, of stimulating industrialization, and, on this basis, of rallying he broad masses around itself, would be able to consolidate and enlarge a unifying federative framework for he Arab countries. The Bonapartist power of Nasser does not have this scope, and his failure would provide the proof of the failure of the general bourgeois leadership of the Arab revolution.
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The crisis in the Far East followed closely upon the Khrushchev-Mao meeting, which leads one to suppose hat it was foreseen there in all its present developments. It began by a military blockade, combining intervention by the coastal batteries and the aviation, of Quemoy and the other neighboring islands, the bases for the constant provocations of the Chiang Kai-Shek lique, protected by Yankee imperialism, against the popular power in China.
The conflict quickly became so far-reaching as to raise the questions both of Chiang Kai-Shek's regime itself and of American presence in the neighborhood of Formosa. It degenerated into a major test of strength between Pekin, backed by the Kremlin, and American imperialism, which among other things af-. forded an opportunity to test a series of new weapons and the performances of the aviation of both sides.
This time Mao seemed to want to force the issue and to recuperate at least the coastal islands as a first , stage. The imperialist allies of the United States were
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL really afraid lest war burst out over Quemoy, and did not fail to bring pressure on Washington to avoid the worst. In the United States itself public opinion, alarmed by the prospect of a major conflict with China, and in that case inevitably with the US SR as well, hesitated to approve the "hard" line adopted by the Republican administration.
And yet this line seems this time to have obtained at least partial results. Washington assembled in the Straits of Formosa the most formidable armada in history, provided with atomic arms, and endowed Chiang Kai-Shek with a whole range of abundant modern weapons.
Mao's military blockade of Quemoy proved partly ineffective. By being continued, it threatened to cause the collapse of the islands' garrison unless there were a more decisive intervention by the Americans to reduce the coastal batteries to silence. Then Mao suddenly ordered a cease-fire, first for one week, then for two more. It is true, in the meantime the Americans had agreed to renew the Chinese-American talks at War-
The balance-sheet of this test of strength, which at moments reached a dramatic and explosive pitch, is not yet entirely clear. Exactly what was Mao after? To cause the collapse of the Quemoy garrison before the Americans intervened ? Did he underestimate the scope and decisiveness of that intervention? Did he simply want to remind international public opinion about the Chinese question and obtain limited diplomatic advantages? Or was this campaign aimed mainly at backing the unheard-of effort now being made within China for colossal objectives and results in the fields of agriculture and industry?
Perhaps there was simultaneously a little of all that in the motives that triggered off the Quemoy conflict.
The trial-balance of this also not resolved crisis shows a different result from that of the Middle East. As against the still limited advantages for Mao — pos sible partial military neutralization of the coastal islands, renewal of negotiations with the United States, success in making the Chinese question timely again -Washington has demonstrated great determination in the defense of Formosa and its Chinese "ally."
The risky policy of the State Department is justified in reality, not by the importance per se of the coastal islands for the defense of Formosa, but by their being a touchstone for the real dispositions and possibilities of American imperialism in face of a possible drive by the new China.
With their hearts in their mouths, the Asiatic allies of Washington — the Philippines, Siam, South Vietnam, Japan, etc - wanted to see whether Mao's guns were already powerful enough to drive the Sixth Fleet -away from the Straits of Formosa and to cause his US protectors to abandon Chiang Kai-Shek.
Dulles's attitude means that the margin of possible retreat for Washington has henceforth become quite
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL narrow, and that, from this viewpoint, in each new test of strength, it will be still more difficult than in the past for the United States to draw back without running the risk of thus losing face and control over all the repercussions of such a retreat.
But on the other hand the Kremlin and Pekin, fortified by the growing power of their countries, conscious of the weaknesses of imperialism and of the fact that an atmosphere of international tension is favorable to their struggle against "revisionism" on the home front, are now led to take major risks, going forward in their turn right up to "the brink of the abyss."
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Under these conditions, how will the international situation develop in the coming months?
In the Arab countries, imperialism will devote its efforts to getting Lebanon back by making it slip imperceptibly from a position of neutrality to a renewed pro-Western position, and to form a "Bourguibist" Maghreb that checks the current of Arab unification and opposes Nasserism. These attempts, however, have but little chance of success.
In the Far East it will give up neither its protection of the "allied" Formosa regime nor the build-up of its military potential. The threat represented by the after all gigantic economic strengthening of China will weigh so increasingly heavily on the destinies of the neighboring Asian countries, even Japan, that imperialism cannot permit itself any exhibitions of obvious weakness. Yet the situation in the majority of those countries, including India, will be aggravated by the fact that their production will remain insufficient compared to their needs and the growth of their populations, by the fact that in reality those countries will for these reasons become poorer compared to the expansive example of China.
It will not be long before a new storm bursts over Asia, in which the hurricane of the new China will blow with an unheard-of devastating force on the present social structures. Consequently the revolutionary perspectives in these regions remain good, with all that that implies of explosiveness in the international situation.
On the other hand, the situation in the metropolitan countries, and particularly in Western Europe, continues to evolve toward the right, whether in France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Holland, or even, lately, in Britain. The recent elections in these countries, as well as other manifestations, make clearly visible this slide to the right.
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Apart from the influence on the masses of the economic boom of late years, the wretched reformist economic policy of the Socialists and Communists is responsible for the European masses pulling away from these parties.
Under the conditions of capitalism as now existent in these countries, it is obvious that the programme of the workers' parties can present a better and more attractive alternative to the masses only in case it aims at profound political and economic achievements that justify the striking superiority of socialism on these two planes.
Furthermore, it is not enough to have a radical socialist programme ; it is necessary also to convince the masses in practice over a whole period that the parties that claim to have such a programme are really fighting, in a consistent and decisive way, for its application.
The recession that is now spreading in Europe may under certain conditions improve the prospects of the workers' movement. While in the United States the economic conjuncture has since April experienced a slight improvement — an increase in production, a pick-up in the steel industry, a lessening of unemployment - in Western Europe the falling-off in the rate of expansion is general, unemployment greater than in 1957, the saturation of the coal and steel markets striking, as well as the decrease in exports toward the underdeveloped countries.
The evolution of the slight pick-up in the United States is still quite uncertain and runs the risk of being blocked by the European recession, — which would in its turn aggravate the latter.
It is in any case sure that the European economy is for a certain time entering a period of falling off, the results of which may rekindle the class reflex of European wage-earners. But at the same time the bourgeoisie, considerably attracted by the relatively easy success of de Gaulle's " strong state, " will begin to give form to their reactionary enterprises.
There is needed a great effort of ideological - and probably in certain cases organizational — renewal of the European workers' movement if it is to be capable of forging the weapons enabling it to face effectively the offensive of the bourgeoisie and to bridge the gap which at present separates the level of the European revolution from that of the colonial revolution. 20 October 1958