after portugal and greece:
a hot autumn in mediterranean europe
The Greek dictatorship, like the Portuguese dictatorship, had to step down because its internal divisions were threatening to bring about the disintegration of the army, the only effective instrument of power left to the decrepit bourgeoisie in both these countries. The dictatorship had to step down because it was becoming a source of embarrassment and crisis for the ruling class and its imperialist protectors. In both cases, the enthronement of a "man of providence, " here Spinola, there Karamanlis, was above all a preventive step. The regime was changed from above to prevent it from being overthrown from below. In both cases, the success of the maneuver is doubtful at best. To be sure, the Greek Caetanos have not yet been driven out. For the moment, they are sharing power with a team of worn out bourgeois politicians who they had not so long ago insulted and humiliated. Even the chief of the military police, loannidis the torturer, is still at his post. It is not yet certain that the generals gave up more than the appearance of power on the night of July 23-24. But the Greek masses, much more hardened and experienced in political life and popular mobilization than were the Portuguese masses on the eve of April 25, will not remain passive spectators before the sordid intrigues being played out among civilians and military men, monarchists and republicans, among the bourgeois personnel now in power in Athens. It was out of fear of the masses that the king and the army plotted the suppression of democratic rights in 1967. It was out of fear of the masses that the Papadopou los regime was replaced by an even more obscurantist regime in November 1973. By opening the door to the eruption of the masses onto the political scene, the night of July 23-24 dealt a death blow to the power of the army. In spite of Karamanlis's efforts to solidify the army's "unity" with the people against the "foreign menace, " it is only a question of time before the army's power passes from the scene. The material demands of the workers crushed by inflation, the democratic and anticapitalist demands of the radicalized youth, and the socialist aspirations of the vanguard of the popular masses will all surge to the surface in the days and weeks ahead. Greece will experience a Portuguese-type development. And in the same sense, the chain reaction touched off on April 25 at the westernmost extremity of southern Europe is bound to spread with growing force along the whole southern editorial face of the continent. The Francoist regime, last remaining far-right dictatorship in Europe, has been dealt a second powerful blow. The impatient hopes of the Spanish working masses will be accentuated. There too some surprises may be in the offing in the near future. In Italy an impressive new rise of workers struggles is maturing and developing. Stimulated by the political weakening suffered by the bourgeoisie after the defeat of the opponents of divorce in the May 12 referendum and the thunderous mass response to fascist terror in Brescia and nourished by the proletariat's indignation at the "austerity plan, " which hits the workers and leaves the rich untouched, the new rise of workers struggles is heating things up in the big factories. Autumn will be hot in Italy. It will be hot in Portugal. It will be hot in Greece. And the interaction of all these fever-pitches will be felt elsewhere too, of that we can be sure. Certainly, the risks and threats remain real. The traditional leaderships of the proletariat are disoriented, hesitant, and fearful in the countries involved. They are afraid of mass action that "might provoke" a forceful return of currents favoring reestablishment of right-wing dictatorships. They are prepared to make any compromise and engage in any sell-out to moderate and slow things down and to break the spirit of the masses. Their essential concern is to show the bourgeoisie that they are loyal and reasonable partners in undertakings that are compatible with a "democratized" capitalist system. But by seeking to break the spirit of the masses, they are precisely creating the conditions for a new rise of far-right dangers, which feed on the instability and impossible situation to which are condemned bourgeois-democratic regimes that are too bankrupt to grant substantial reforms and too weak to break the workers combativity. The revolutionary vanguard as yet possesses neither the necessary strength nor implantation to be considered by the proletariat as a credible alternative to the traditional conciliating and treacherous leaderships. The crisis will therefore persist. There will be a race between the reorganization of the far right and the strengthening of the far left, of its capacity to convince and unite broader and broader layers of the proletariat and toiling masses. It takes time and it will take more time to construct new mass revolutionary parties, powerful sections of the Fourth International. No one can yet say whether the delay opened by the revolutionary crisis in southern Europe will be of long enough duration to attain that goal.
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But one thing is certain. The fundamental tendency in coming months will be toward the broadening and not the retreat of the mass movement. The swing of the pendulum favors the proletariat, not the bourgeoisie. It is up to revolutionaries to exploit this opportunity to the fullest by patiently explaining to the masses the great chances for socialist revolution, the risks that threaten those chances if this opportunity is not seized upon, the congenital weaknesses of the reformist proCYPRUS the