THE COMMUNISTS AND THE COMMON MARKET
Torna, Peter A.
The Communists and the Common Market by PETER A. TOMA The day that General de Gaulle vetoed British entry into the Common Market has been described by West Germany's Vice-Chancellor Ludwig Erhard...
...It has been hampered by conflicts of interest among the member countries...
...The Common Market population was 170 million, as against 307 million for CEMA...
...The eventual result should be a more unified and economically stable East Europe—a goal of Soviet policy...
...However, whether this goal will be achieved will depend greatly on the Soviet leaders—to what extent they will permit satellite autonomy in CEMA...
...For the Soviet bloc, this means a new problem in economic planning and undoubtedly a decrease in its Gross National Product...
...The emotional and psychological complex that West Germany is still Soviet Russia's major threat—more so than the United States—prevents the Kremlin from viewing Austria's concern in the Common Market as dictated by that small country's economic needs...
...The Soviets' chagrin must run deep, in view of the Kremlin's failure to integrate the people's democracies of East Europe into the "socialist" common market, the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance—Comecon, or CEMA as the Russians call it...
...An example of such domination took place at the June, 1962, CEMA meeting in Moscow when Khrushchev demanded tighter integration of the satellites with the Soviet Union, based on an overall economic plan that would take advantage of local conditions...
...This represented 21.4 per cent of Poland's total exports...
...But the CEMA countries, with each national economy run by its own central planning, are trying to coordinate their plans so as to achieve, in effect, one international plan for the entire Soviet bloc...
...None of them is strong enough to attempt this individually...
...Prior to the day when "one man's will thwarted the hopes of so many," the Kremlin offered two explanations for West European integration...
...They could be severely damaged by the raising of Western tariff walls against them...
...But because of her underdeveloped industry, which might have created great disparity in the Common Market, the Council of Ministers in 1961 recommended only associate membership status...
...Capital does not flow freely from one CEMA country to another, investments are rigidly planned, and the worker's freedom of movement is restricted even within his own country...
...On the other hand, there is a growth of tendencies and forces disuniting the capitalist states and engendering clashes between them...
...Although the Common Market would, according to new Soviet reasoning, turn into a dangerous competitor for the United States and Britain and thus fulfill the Communist prediction about "capitalist self-destruction," the Kremlin now fears a possibility that if de Gaulle succeeds in building up a separate nuclear might, and if the treaty between West Germany and France is ratified, West Germany will influence France toward some adventure in Eastern Europe which could touch off a nuclear war without NATO involvement...
...In the case of Austria, it was also claimed to be a violation of international law...
...What is the impact of the Common Market on the Soviet bloc...
...Actually, the reasons for recommending that Ireland become an associate member, as Greece still remains today, are strictly economic and not military...
...One could interpret this ingenious move by Communist Czechoslovakia as a planned attempt to get into the Common Market through the back door of Austria...
...Perhaps the responsibility for CEMA's failure lies with the Soviet Union, the leader of the group...
...On that occasion Khrushchev told Keita that "one of the principal aims of the Common Market is to harness a number of liberated countries to the economy of the imperialist states and keep them in bondage...
...The crux of the problem is, of course, "alliance with the Federal Republic of Germany...
...For Moscow, however, it was cheerful news and according to Pravda, it means defeat for the U.S...
...The Common Market countries The Communists and the Common Market are trying to remove the national obstacles to trade within the area, such as tariffs and import quotas, and to encourage the free flow of labor and capital across their borders...
...Since 1958, the Soviets have considered Federal Germany as the country dominating the EEC and planning to exploit it for its "revanchist" ends...
...Conceivably, the present situation could lead to regional economic integration within CEMA, with an identity and momentum of its own...
...The only solution for the threatened underdeveloped countries, the Communists allege, is to multiply their ties with the Soviet Union, in order to avoid new "imperialism...
...it has not been able to achieve a coordinated investment program, and it is still handicapped by lack of a common price structure...
...Their methods, however, are different...
...The European Economic Community (EEC), popularly known as the Common Market, was identified as "the economic arm of the aggressive militaristic NATO bloc...
...Because of her national interest, and pressures emanating from both the West and her satellites, the Kremlin has no other alternative at this time but to accept trade charts and statistics presented by the satellite economists, supporting closer economic ties with Western Europe...
...In 1961, only 5.8 per cent of the Common Market's foreign trade was with the CEMA group...
...ally be a general economic depression that would then enable local Communist parties to take over...
...Poland's partners in CEMA would gladly buy the food but they cannot supply the right kind of goods in exchange...
...Instead of identifying the Common Market with NATO, the Kremlin propagandists now see the danger stemming from the conclusion of a treaty between West Germany and France providing for close cooperation in foreign affairs and military and cultural matters...
...The aims of both CEMA and the Common Market are essentially the same—to escape from the limitations of national boundaries and obtain the advantages that modern technology offers in producing goods for larger markets...
...Underlying the Soviet's opposition to the West European integration movement is the abiding fear that such an entity as the Common Market could set up a magnetic attraction, not only for the neutrals, but also for Moscow's own satellites...
...Such are the paradoxes of CEMA...
...The irony of this situation is in CEMA's planning...
...The latest, not the last, Soviet criticism against membership in the Common Market, was promulgated by the Kremlin not long ago when Ireland submitted formal application to join the European Economic Community...
...What are the Soviet propaganda measures employed against West European integration and the European Economic Community, and when were they initiated...
...When Sweden and Switzerland expressed an interest in the Common Market, the Soviets denounced any form of association as a "renunciation of neutrality...
...In 1961, the value of Polish agricultural exports—of which ninety per cent are sold in the West—was nearly a half billion dollars...
...Farm exports account for 56.3 per cent of Poland's income in hard Western currencies, supplying her with funds for badly needed Western machinery, raw materials, and consumer goods...
...This tactic of "guilt by association" is employed by the Kremlin not only against the African neutrals, such as Mali and Guinea (Ghana is an exception because her President Kwame Nkrumah, in July, 1961, while touring the Soviet Union, joined Khrushchev in criticizing the Common Market as the greatest danger hanging over Africa) but also against the neutrals of Europe...
...Apparently the exclusion of Britain from the Common Market has altered little the Kremlin's fundamental philosophy on West European integration, although there is recognition of changing economic alliances...
...Khrushchev charged that some African leaders shared "only the color of their skins with their people" but otherwise were still "servants of imperialism...
...To paraphrase Karl Marx in rebuttal: "A specter is haunting Europe— the specter of West European integration...
...Import and export accounts between any two satellite countries must balance exactly because none of the East European currencies is convertible...
...However, a further look at the figures shows that in certain agricultural products the Soviet bloc trade with the Common Market countries is of great importance to the Communists...
...The CEMA group—comprising the Soviet Union, Poland, Ulbricht's German Democratic Republic, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria (Albania until November, 1962) —has had little tangible success thus far, although the Council has been in existence since 1949 and has been promoting a "division of labor" among its members since May, 1958...
...When the Greek government made formal application in 1959 for membership in the EEC, Greece was a full fledged member of NATO...
...One was directed to the non-party world (or the "outside" audience) and the other to the Communist party (the "inside" audience...
...Ever since the friendship rally for President Modibo Keita of Mali, in May, 1962, in Moscow, the Soviet Union has condemned the Common Market as a danger to the underdeveloped countries, as a device by which the United States means to control Western Europe, and as a creation of "monopoly capitalism...
...Imperialist integration," wrote S. Viskov (in International Affairs, January, 1962), "is a dual process...
...They simply can't explain how 'moribund' capitalism created this true revolution...
...While Poland is sitting on a pile of surplus meat, butter, eggs, potatoes, sugar, and poultry, other Soviet bloc countries are suffering from shortages of the very same foodstuffs...
...The United States, Khrushchev has pointed out, "has not succeeded, and will not succeed, in overcoming the latter tendency...
...By contrast, the Common Market has been a brilliant and magnetic success and hence a great embarrassment to the leaders of the Soviet bloc...
...Europeans have nothing to lose but their tariff barriers...
...The CEMA countries provided thirty-three per cent of the pork, 32.3 per cent of the eggs, and 25.2 per cent of the poultry imported by the EEC...
...The Communists and the Common Market by PETER A. TOMA The day that General de Gaulle vetoed British entry into the Common Market has been described by West Germany's Vice-Chancellor Ludwig Erhard as "the black day for Europe...
...On the one hand, the imperialists are exerting greater efforts to build up a compact supra-state system which would absorb the national sovereignty of its member states...
...Austria's interest in the European Economic Community, at the risk of Soviet displeasure, may have been a factor in the five-year trade agreement which Czechoslovakia signed with her on February 14, 1962, providing for a twenty per cent increase in trade that year and a sixty per cent increase by 1966...
...The Common Market, the party members were told, was established as a counterweight to the United States on the one hand, and Britain and the Commonwealth on the other because a natural trait of capitalism is the "war of all against all...
...Greater participation of satellite experts, and fewer Soviet bureaucrats in CEMA, will probably eliminate in the near future such paradoxes as the Polish food surplus...
...Specifically, Austria has been criticized for seeking to associate herself with the Common Market on the ground that this would be a violation of the Austrian State Treaty of 1955, which requires Austria to be neutral...
...This was met by opposition from the Polish delegation, which argued that it would cut Poland off from critical sources of manufactured goods and specialized equipment from Western Europe...
...According to Gardner Cowles, publisher of Look magazine, who in 1962 interviewed Khrushchev in the Kremlin, "The Common Market is something the Russians just can't fathom...
...Soviet foreign language broadcasts denouncing the Common Market are now beamed to every country which might be remotely affected by it...
...How does the West European integration movement affect relations between the Soviet Union and her satellites...
...To Africans and Asians, the Kremlin seeks to prove that the Common Market represents new "colonialism...
...The CEMA countries affected most by this trade are Poland, Hungary, and Bulgaria...
...After Professor Walter Hall-stein, President of the EEC Commission, explained that for the time being Ireland should become an associate rather than a full member of the EEC, the Soviets skillfully interpreted this to mean that Ireland must first join NATO, and only then could she qualify for full membership in the Common Market...
...In 1960, only two years after its formation, the Common Market nations produced more steel than did the CEMA group, more cement, approximately the same amount of electric power, somewhat less bituminous coal, about the same amount of milk, and much more machinery...
...It leaves them stunned...
...As explained by G. Osnitskaya (in International Affairs, Moscow, June, 1962), "Austria's participation in the Common Market would in the first place denote an alliance with the Federal Republic of Germany, which is in contradiction to Article Four of the State Treaty...
...Soviet theorists were willing to concede that the Common Market had created greater expansion opportunities for the so-called "top monopolies," but they insisted that this expansion was only at the expense of weaker rivals, and that the net result of this "cut-throat rivalry between the big monopoly interests" would eventuPETER A. TOMA is an associate professor in the department of government at the University of Arizona...
...Poland, for example, provides nine-tenths of the pork, two-thirds of the eggs, and one-half of the poultry exported by CEMA countries to the Common Market...
...If the Soviet Union becomes more flexible, and therefore more pragmatic towards her satellites, it will be possible for these satellites to form coalitions in CEMA and thus assert their independence of Soviet domination...
...The "outsiders" were made to believe that the new capitalist economic blocs in Western Europe were anti-Communist in design and direction and that one of the objects of West European unity was economic boycott of the Communist bloc countries...
...The countries of Eastern and Central Europe have been looking more and more to trade with the West to bolster their own economies...
...In 1949, CEMA began as a more or less typical Soviet administrative organ, with a charter allowing the USSR to dominate every CEMA activity...
...Hence the flood of Kremlin propaganda that mounts daily...
...Its fabulous growth is contrary to all lessons of Marx, Lenin, and Khrushchev...
...A new stringent tariff and quota system restricting Common Market agricultural imports from Eastern Europe could bring an economic cataclysm to these three CEMA countries...
...The standard of living and general economic development of the Common Market partners were far in advance of CEMA countries...
...Such a process of integration, while more gradual than one imposed by Soviet fiat, would probably have greater support from member states and, hence, should proceed more smoothly in the future than it has in the past...
...They have a better world to win...
...The CEMA group now is concerned with the same problem that bothers some Western countries which do not belong to the Common Market: While the members of the EEC are reducing trade barriers among themselves, they intend to maintain a uniform tariff wall against outside countries...
...effort to organize Western Europe to the disadvantage of the Soviet bloc...
...The "insiders," however, were told that the so-called national state-monopoly organizations, springing up under the motto of "integration," were in reality new forms of the redivision of the "world capitalist market," and thus were becoming focal points of acute strain and conflict...
...Exports of food and agricultural produce play an important role in Warsaw's foreign trade...
Vol. 27 • June 1963 • No. 6
