Three Ways to Defeat Communism
MEANY, GEORGE
THREE WAYS TO DEFEAT COMMUNIST IMPERIALISM Military power, social progress and defense against subversion are all necessary By George Meany The present world crisis is not only political. It is,...
...We must do nothing to ease Moscow's difficulties with the satellites...
...They never find the time to utter a word of condemnation against the Communist imperialist destruction of the national independence and democratic rights of hundreds of millions of people in Europe and Asia...
...It is, above all, a moral crisis...
...Khrushchev, Kaganovich and Bulganin have openly and impudently said so...
...In addition, we must also exploit the political differences and economic difficulties within the Soviet Empire...
...It is shocking to see the studied attempts being made by Western diplomacy to tear to shreds the Charter of the United Nations under the guise of the so-called package deal [for UN admissions] with Moscow and Peking...
...But what we have they want from us in order to help and save them from the follies of Communism and Soviet imperialism...
...In this light, the free world faces the following dangers: -The military power of the Moscow-Peking Axis...
...If Russia were not a totalitarian dictatorship, a huge imperialist power with a world ambition and mission, we would not be facing today a world-wide fifth column, the international Communist conspiracy...
...Its central aim is the extension of the present Moscow-Peking Empire to include the entire world...
...But racialism in reverse-as now propagated in India and Burma by Khrushchev and Bulganin-is just as reprehensible...
...Moscow wants relaxation to affirm and strengthen its conquests of yesterday as a base for more Communist conquests tomorrow...
...We of the democratic camp must develop a far more vigorous moral attitude...
...Actually, Communism represents darkest reaction...
...It is just as wrong to think that Communist imperialism can be defeated with arms alone as to say that it can be beaten with social reforms or social-security legislation alone...
...It is rather disturbing to me that many people in our country who call themselves liberals are stone silent about the Soviet concentration camps...
...I am all for a fight to the finish against racialism in our own midst...
...Only by refusing to be thus entrapped can liberals shed every vestige of subconscious and conscious regard for Communism as a movement with which they have something in common...
...They must shun like a plague the role of being anti-anti-Communist...
...They have nothing that can help us...
...They are aides and allies in fact and in effect, if not in diplomatic verbiage...
...They are positive...
...We must avoid the suicidal self-deception of the Popular Front and "united front...
...We face three tasks in meeting these dangers: -To develop military forces strong enough to deter and defeat direct and indirect aggression...
...It is an anti-social system in which there are embedded some of the worst features of savagery, slavery, feudalism and life-sapping exploitation manifested in the industrial revolution of early-day capitalism...
...Communist subversion within non-Communist countries-especially in colonial and underdeveloped areas...
...One would expect the true liberal to cry out in protest against human beings being carted, lagged and shuttled about for weeks in railyards of Russia, as if they were carloads of coal or bags of potatoes...
...Communism is the deadliest enemy of liberalism...
...We have grave weaknesses in our social and economic armor...
...Moscow is sure it has history's timetables in its pocket...
...That is why the Communist parties are not political parties in the democratic sense of the word...
...If we win on one or two fronts and the enemy breaks through on the third, we of the free world might lose all...
...Such struggles and such protests are not negative actions...
...We do not need theirs...
...Liberals must also be on guard against developing a certain type of McCarthyism of their own...
...Not until we of the free world can give rebirth to a vibrant moral attitude, to a burning indignation against such frightful bestialities, can the freedom-loving people be sufficiently stirred to gather the moral strength for resisting and defeating the totally anti-moral dogmas and deeds of Communism at home and abroad...
...They are only national sectors of a Russian-directed world body...
...Defense of freedom and the free state against fifth columns at home...
...We have especially serious weaknesses in our moral and intellectual armor...
...We must rekindle our capacity to cry out against, to protest against, the godless dogmas and savage crimes being perpetrated by Moscow...
...Too many in the free world seem to have lost their capacity for moral indignation against the most brutal inhumanities when they are perpetrated by Communists...
...The military weight and material resources of the Soviet state are the base, the heart and head of Communist activities everywhere...
...They are not alternatives...
...No country, no people, no movement can stand aloof and be neutral in this struggle...
...We must do nothing to help the Kremlin get over the difficulties arising from the struggle over succession to Stalin...
...Can it be that the free world is so weak in its moral spirit that it does not recognize this deal as appeasement of the worst kind...
...Nehru and Tito are not neutral...
...We should avoid being fooled by the more flexible and more cautious tactics of a regime which is still seeking to consolidate itself and enhance its authority In fact, the more the Khrushchev regime feels itself secure, the more harsh and frontal its attacks will become...
...Diplomatic-commercial maneuvers...
...George Meany, president of the AFL-CIO, is a man with strong views on foreign policy and a direct way of expressing them...
...This godless church-state fights on all fronts, in all walks of life, and with any and all means...
...On the outcome of this conflict depends the future of all mankind...
...Moscow has sought relaxation not as an end, but as a means to strengthen Soviet imperialism...
...The three tasks are necessary...
...They must go together and be applied simultaneously...
...And the Communist imprisonment of hundreds of thousands of hostages, so-called war prisoners, ten years after the close of the war, in violation of every human right and international agreement, is morally reprehensible...
...They are organically tied up with each other...
...This means being rigid in support of our principles...
...Liberals should be the most consistent and energetic fighters against Communism...
...If it were that simple, there would be nothing to worry about...
...What they have can only hurt us...
...They need our help...
...We have nothing to fear from peaceful competition...
...This conflict mirrors our age, its toils, its tensions, its troubles and its tasks...
...It would be wrong to think that the weakness of the free world in the face of the Communist onslaught has been only military...
...I pray that, on the threshold of the Atomic Age, we of the free world can muster the moral courage and total strength to preserve the peace and promote the freedom of the men and women of every continent, color and creed...
...It overshadows all other problems...
...To develop social, economic and political superiority of democratic order through international cooperation, freedom and social progress for colonial peoples and underdeveloped countries and through the advancement of social justice in every free country...
...It is painful, but we must face the cruel facts of life...
...Here is his view of the challenge posed by Geneva and its aftermath, as presented in a recent address before the National Religion and Labor Foundation...
...I know of nothing more positive and constructive than a total struggle against the totalitarian cancer in the body-politic of modern society...
...This brute force is combined with a phony religious fanaticism...
...This is proved by Russia's unchanged and uncompromising attitude to the basic causes of world tension...
...We must defeat Communist imperialism, Communist ideology and Communist subversion, and not merely any one of these evils...
...Too many in the free world are still prisoners of the illusion that Communism is, historically speaking, a progressive system-extreme liberalism temporarily making bad mistakes...
...Much more regard must be shown by the democracies for principles-for the principles of human rights and human freedom...
...Racialism is damnable and detestable in any form...
...Communism is the very opposite of liberalism...
...We must never sacrifice principles to expediency...
...This subversion moves in various stages: neutralization, paralysis and full control...
...Too many in the free world fail to see the real nature of Communism as the mortal foe of everything that we hold dear, of every moral and spiritual value...
...The recent Bulganin-Khrushchev tour of India and Burma is a striking example of Soviet insincerity...
...In the diplomatic field, we should do nothing to help build up the authority of the new regime among the Soviet peoples...
...If a democratic Russia had played as important a role in defeating Hitler, the post-victory claims and counter-claims could have been settled through the normal channels of statesmanship and diplomatic negotiations...
...The Soviet state and its foreign branches constitute a godless church-state...
...Yes, this means above all a moral struggle against Communism...
...They are morally and politically constructive...
...I cannot emphasize too strongly: The conflict between Communism and freedom is the problem of our time...
...Hitler once thought so, too...
Vol. 38 • December 1955 • No. 51
