In Santiago on August 9, the. Regional Committee of the MIR . ended the passivity of the solidarity meetings, organizing a mili- §° tant march through the main streets of the city. The demonstrators carried large banners inscribed, "The MIR Supports the Vietcong Guerrillas!."'. "Down, with the Yankee Imperialists, Murderers of. Vietorsute nam!" ee a
Many vovkers cheered the action. of the MIR in the crowded
business and shopping center of Santiago. Others joined the march, converting it into a solid column.
During August the Communist party staged a campaign, particularly on the campus, appealing for blood to be sent to Vietnam. On. September 1 a group of high-school students in the pro-Peking "Spartacus." group (now renamed the Partido Comunista Revolucionario) distributed a leaflet at the Pedagogical Institute denouncing the © campaign as a fraud, since the blood could never be sent to Vietnam. A group belonging to the Communist Youth attacked them and a fight broke out in which rocks, sticks and clubs were used. Several students were injured.
The incident broadened when Senator Jaime Barros (who broke from the CP two years ago and joined Spartacus) declared that : Dr. Bahamondes, head of the Blood Bank of the Chilean Red Cross, =. had notified the CP of the impossibility :.of sending blood to Viet- .. nam since the means were lacking in Chile. to produce dry plasma. "These revisionist parliamentarians," said Barros, "told the chairman of the Red Cross that they only wanted a 'symbolic' campaign, which can only be interpreted as meaning that they are not interested in seeing that the blood actually reaches Vietnam, but only in taking advantage of the campaign and the prestige of the struggle of the Vietnamese people in order to smuggle in their opportun=. ist political line." (Quoted in the daily La Naci6n.)
This denunciation was confirmed by a statement made by the Chilean Red Cross which the Communist party daily El Siglo felt
obliged to print (September 3). The statement said, "From the begin- © ning, everyone who insisted on this matter was repeatedly told that due to material and technical difficulties, the blood could not. be sent to the Red Cross of: North Vietnam.
Acaquiescing - sin insistent demands from the rank and file, the board of the Student Center of the Pedagogical Institute held an) assembly September 2. It was attended by more than P00. The Communist leader Carlos Cerda took the floor.
He had to admit that it "was very difficult" to send the blood to Vietnam and that there had been "precipitate action without waiting for the reply of the Red Cross." This "explanation" wasgreeted with whistles: ‘and catcalls by the student an _
The Socialists declared ‘that the Communists » were responsible for the fraud. "We Socialists," said Urquieta, "were naive, we were taken unawares, but we are going to learn from this. It is very grave because it involves having taken advantage of the profound feelings of solidarity with the Vietnamese patriots. m a
Later the Communists objected to a Spartacus high-school student taking the floor. But the youth of the Socialist party and. the members of the MIR, who were present in considerable numbers, © insisted that the comrade of the pro-Chinese group should be permitted to speak. The Communists threatened to withdraw. The student ranks told them to go ahead .and the Communists decided: to remain. —
A student leader of the MIR, Danton Chelén, said, "The best help to Vietnam is to struggle to accelerate the revolution ‘in Chile. It is not enough to carry on passive campaigns; militant demonstrations are needed which try to incorporate the workers in. . the anti-imperialist struggle as the only way of demanding the withdrawal of the Yankee ‘troops in ‘Vietnam and of helping — the Vietcong guerrillas to win."
In a speech that lifted the political level of the discussion, the representative of theMIR "appealed for a united front of student youth of the left." (Quoted in the September 4 El Clarin. ) Chelén ended by saying that "in order to win the leadership of the FECH [Federacién dé Estudiantés de Chile] away from the bourgeois Christian Democracy, a united front of all the students of the left . is necessary, including the ‘young Communists , Socialists and others , without any political discrimination." ne
The leader of the MIR was given an ovation by the audience: which’ ‘began to work out a manifesto appealing for a united front.
Upon ending -the assembly, the students organized a fighting demonstration against the U.S. embassy. According to the daily El Mercurio, "The: demonstrators carried :a North Vietnam flag. As. they went along they picked up stones and other projectiles. Within minutes almost all the windows ‘lacking protective screens were broken. Likewise broken was a large jardiniere standing in the
inside garden, which belonged to one of the consulate officials. A carabinero, Luis Perez, who was on guard, took out his revolver to threaten the Marxists, but did not pull the trigger. In return he received a rock in the head. In the scuffle, Sergio Perez, a student of history and geography in the Pedagogical Institute, was arrested."
The students forced the police to retreat and several. of them climbed the window gratings and got inside the embassy. In.a half: hour police reinforcements arrived. They went to the defense .of ‘the U.S. embassy with clubs and water trucks. Besides Sergio Perez, Communists and members of the MIR were arrested.
Some conclusions can be drawn:
(1) The concrete struggle in support of ‘the guerrillas of the Vietnamese National Liberation Front made it possible to unite in action young rank-and-file Communists together with Socialists, Trotskyists, Maoists and members of the MIR.
(2) The bureaucratic leaders of the Communist party were ; unmasked once more not only by means of criticism but fundamentally. by means of revolutionary action.
(3) The name of the. MIR was widely reported in the press and. over the radio. The MIR's correct political line and militant action opened a way to initiate a united front. with other tendencies of the Chilean left. On the day following the action against the U.S. oo embassy, the leftist students met and signed a manifesto appealing for formation of a Revolutionary United Front. .
(4) Of the two opposed ways’ of supporting Vietnam it was shown to the students and workers:.that. the only correct policy -consists in appealing to the ranks , ‘to assemblies, to discuss demaoceratically and act unitedly ina fighting struggle against the. . main enemy, Yankee imperialism.
JAPAN'S TRADE WITH THE USSR, CHINA, ON THE RISE
- In the first six months of 1966, Japanese trade with the USSR and the People's Republic of China showed increases of 41 and 30 percent over the same period last year. Customs figures showed | $320 ;204,000 with China and #e38 784,000 with the Soviet Union in a the January-June period. 7
The figures represented 3.5 percent and 2.8 percent, respectively, of