Molotov and Tito

...Thus, the entire Rumanian shakeup was a calculated affront to Belgrade...

...The assertion in his February 8 speech that the Soviet Union had laid "the foundations" of socialism sharply contradicted the official party line, according to which the country is already in a state of transition from socialism to communism...

...The close collaboration between Moscow and Belgrade in this area, which was broadly outlined but not specifically defined, has produced bitter conflict instead of general amity...

...Wheu he proceeded to attend the Geneva Foreign Ministers' Conference, speculation quickly died down...

...What, then, was involved in the Kommunist incident...

...However, a struggle over the new foreign-policy course is clearly in progress at the top levels, and its tempo is rising...

...Tito is said to be in economic distress and is demanding heavy reparations for the damage inflicted by his former Cominform partners...

...Franz Borkenau has devoted a lifetime to the study of international Communism, first from within, then from without...

...If there is a difference of opinion on this in the top leadership, Molotov, who has never had anything to do with economic matters, cannot be prominently involved...

...The Yugoslav complaints all follow one line...

...The latter, moreover, is obviously not alone, but enjoys at least qualified support from left-wing Army circles...

...Belgrade reacted to this ill-timed reminiscence with a bitter press attack defending Nose's memory and protesting against Albanian sabotage of the new spirit of friendship...

...He has astounded observers with his predictions on the Kremlin, predicting Stalin's death a few weeks before the dictator's "stroke" was announced...

...The speech seems to have been written in great haste (in the period of Malenkov's fall from power) and contains countless statements of the official Party line on the building of socialism...

...The satellites' continued hostility toward Yugoslavia, despite Soviet attempts to regain her friendship, stems from a Khrushchev-Molotov policy conflict MOLOTOV AND TiTO By Franz Borkenau On October 1, Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov confessed to a "deviation" in a letter to the Communist party theoretical journal Kommunist...

...is facilitated by the fact that the agreement regulated the new relations between Yugoslavia and the satellites only in very general terms...

...It seems likely that Khrushchev wanted to strike a decisive blow against Molotov but was prevented from doing so...

...The Party Congress in February will show whether such conflicts exist, but it was clearly farfetched to base the accusation against Molotov on them...

...The latter will be confronted with a fait accompli: The regrouping of leadership has already taken place, and its meaning is clear...

...Three factors stand out in this situation...

...in using the phrase, had in mind what he now says he did...

...These attacks are related to Khrushchev's unexpected second visit to Bucharest and also, presumably, to the convocation for December 23 of the oft-postponed Rumanian Party Congress...

...Rakosi, Chishnevsky, et al...

...Indeed, had Molotov's total destruction been desired, it would have taken the form not of a dignified letter in Kommunist but of an abject confession delivered before some high Party forum and printed in the entire Party press...

...It is quite plain, particularly in view of the Yugoslavs' personal attacks on Rakosi before the conference, that the negotiations failed on political issues...

...It would seem more likely that others, such as Kaganovitch or Saburov, are contending that the building of socialism has not gone far enough and that another tremendous industrialization drive is needed...

...And even the special Yugoslav correspondents who visited Warsaw delivered themselves of bitter-sweet remarks which left Belgrade considerable leeway in its future attitude toward Poland...

...It has been clear at least since last March, when Tito attacked Molotov in a public speech, that the Foreign Minister is his chief adversary in the Soviet camp...

...The second straw in the wind was the recent reorganization of the Rumanian Government and Party leadership...

...Since the agreement concluded by Khrushchev and Bulganin in Belgrade last spring, there has been an unbroken series of Yugoslav attacks, both open and concealed, on all the European satellite regimes with the exception of Poland...

...First is the failure of the Yugoslav-Hungarian reparations talks, to which Hungary sent the shrewd, tough Laszlo Hay, Soviet economist Eugene Varga's nephew and a loyal backer of Party boss Matyas Rakosi...

...The connection between this and the Belgrade agreement was demonstrated by the Yugoslav attacks just previously on the Rumanian leaders, particularly former Party Secretary Chishnevsky, who had been in eclipse for more than a year...

...Rumania's provocation was followed by that of tiny Albania...

...this means an advance for the Army??or, more accurately, for the Chief Political Administration of the Soviet Army, to which Bodnaras has been closely linked for decades and Tito has been anathema since the war...

...of course, rather pointless in itself...

...There is no question that the man who gave the satellite leaders the courage to undertake this open sabotage was Molotov...

...His hook European Communism is the classic description of Comintern activity in the '20s and '30s...

...New material has emerged since Molotov's letter and press conference which helps answer this question...

...What finally emerged was a light slap which scarcely harmed the latter...

...The press there launched a series of particularly ferocious attacks on "traitors" dating to earlier periods of Party history and expressed its retrospective joy over the hanging back in 1949 of Interior Minister Xoxe and a group of his supporters...

...Some correspondents thought Molotov's downfall was at hand, but a few days later the Foreign Minister told a press conference that this was nonsense...

...Sabotage of the Belgrade agreement by Molotov...

...Obviously, powerful persons are protecting Molotov in the bitter debates now raging over this question in the Kremlin...

...His chief deputy is to be Tito's arch-foe Chishnevsky, who has moved up from the fifth or sixth to the third ranking position in the Party...

...The self-criticism forced on Molotov is...

...Far from halting Moloxov's sabotage and clearly defining Moscow policy on this question, the recent Molotov affair shows that dissension over the satellites is continuing in the Kremlin...

...An accusation against Molotov was needed, but??and this is the crucial point??it could not be based on the issue which was actually involved, i.e., that of the Belgrade agreement and coexistence in general...

...Eager to find a simple explanation, some observers attribute this imbroglio to money considerations...

...The choice of Hay, who is an intransigent negotiator and very much a politician under his economist's cloak, was a clear sign...

...Belgrade continues to maintain that the satellite leaders have paid no more than lip-service to the Soviet-Yugoslav agreement...

...Unquestionably,money is playing a part, but the heaviest Yugoslav attacks are purely political in character...

...Gheorghiu-Dej, who is notoriously anti-Tito, has given up the relatively unimportant Premier's post and taken on the more important job of Party Secretary...

...but it is most doubtful that Molotov...

...The latter was, of course, a Titoist faction that was arrested just as it was on the point of staging a coup...

...Tito had evidently expected his first mild criticisms to bring the satellite leaders around, but instead (with the partial exception of Poland) they became tougher and tougher and adamantly refused to confess past sins...

...The new First Deputy Premier is General Bodnaras...

...It concerns a swelling tide of polemic and of obvious, though not always public, conflict over Marshal Tito of Yugoslavia...