New York, New York – 1989
It is undoubtedly naive on my part to believe that members of such a highly responsible body as yours would take the time to read a letter from an individual, a foreign individual at that, who has no important organizational ties nor public reputation, one who, moreover, is presumptuous enough to offer criticisms of certain phenomena taking place in the Soviet Union.
My only claim to your attention, perhaps, is that I have been struggling for close to three decades for peaceful coexistence between our two countries, have been struggling against the policies of the imperialists, especially those of my own government, and have been struggling to achieve here in the United States that rational and humane system which is socialism.
We who wish the Soviet Union well and who wish socialism well-support the movement for socialist renewal, important components of which have become known as perestroika and glasnost.
As we understand it, the essence of perestroika is a restructuring of the economy of the Soviet Union, primarily through means of decentralization, to organize production so as to more intimately link self-interest and the social welfare. Glasnost seems in its essence to be promoting self-criticism as the driving intellectual force of social progress, and self-criticism requires honest and open examination of all facets of social life, past and current. Both glasnost and perestroika require democratization and stimulation of the people’s political and economic creative initiative.
We who take our stand on Leninism agree with the principles underlying the present Soviet reforms, since as the top leadership has indicated, what would seem to be involved is a return to Leninist principles, principles which have been ignored or violated by post-Lenin leadership.
But as friends of the Soviet Union, as Leninists, as supporters of socialism, we must communicate our growing alarm at what we see in the speeches and articles of a number of Soviet leaders, officials and publicists, which represent not a return to Leninist principles but rather a gross departure from such principles.
While “new thinking” is always welcome when it is a matter of shaking loose from dogmatic attitudes, we find that the concept of “new thinking” is being widely used to smuggle in not new thinking at all, but very old and stale ideas from.the arsenal of bourgeois and imperialist ideology.
Many of the most flagrant and shocking of such anti-Marxist, anti-Leninist, anti-socialist ideas do not come from the top Soviet leadership, we admit. But the question is growing whether these ideas are anticipatory, kind of trial balloons, part of a “softening-up” process for an anti-socialist course, or whether they will eventually receive the repudiation they deserve.
We have said that we support perestroika and understand its necessity, but we are troubled by tendencies not merely to want to emulate capitalist efficiency; which of course Lenin advocated, but to want to replicate the motive forces of capitalism, which remain bestial and anachronistic.
We applaud glasnost and democratization, but we condemn tendencies ‘to idealize bourgeois liberalism, which is a cruel deception, an illusion from which advanced workers in the capitalist world and many within the former colonies have freed themselves long ago.
One of the elements of what is called “new thinking,” as represented in Soviet literature and official pronouncements, is the notion of the “transcendence” of a number of “human” concerns over class interests. Thus, for example, the threat of a nuclear holocaust and the ecological crisis are considered to be “above” class interests, representing instead universal interests. This reminds us of efforts in the past to use the young Marx’s early writings with its humanist terminology as a weapon against Lenin and the world communist movement.
We all know, however, that Marx waged a furious struggle against the “true socialists” of his day who preached an abstract humanitarianism and denied the class basis of morality and the class-driven essence of the socialist movement. Marx in his attacks on “true socialism” stressed that the most revolutionary class, the proletariat, appropriates the entire progressive legacy of the past, all that which is positive in human achievement, stressed that the proletariat takes up and represents the interests of all oppressed and suffering humanity. One of Marx’s fundamental ideas is that it is precisely through the pursuit of its own class interest, organizing itself for itself, that the liberation of all humankind would be achieved.
Naturally, the destruction of the world in a nuclear holocaust is desired by no class or social strata, and ecological issues are of concern to all classes. But does this mean that we may place questions of peace and ecology above classes? There is no such metaphysical region. People are divided into classes. This is a social reality. And that which is beneficial or harmful to those classes is a reflection of class interests. What is really indicated by the indisputable fact that no one wishes to have the world come to an end is simply that the issue of the earth’s survival crosses class lines. But that is far from saying it is above classes. To detach interest from its roots in people’s concrete socio-economic position is simply to disavow the very alpha of Marxism and the whole empirical history of humankind on which that alpha of Marxism is based. We do not dispute that today’s weapons of mass destruction warrant new ways of thinking about international politics.
We are faced with the new situation that the unrestrained efforts by the imperialists to pursue their predatory interests carries with them the possibility of total world destruction. At the same time, there are new possibilities for avoiding a nuclear Armageddon, for the situation of mutually assured destruction is having a sobering effect on the imperialists. On the other side, the unprecedented peril creates new requirements of caution for anti-imperialists in dealing with imperialism’s aggressive tendencies. Such caution is entirely reasonable and is understood by mature progressives, as is the necessity to retreat if compelled by circumstances.
Still, all this does not change the class basis of international politics. We see that it is the imperialists who still create and maintain hotbeds of tension, create and maintain dangerous situations, continue their policies of diktat, intimidation and economic violence, while the socialist countries continue to work for peaceful coexistence and the reduction of tensions. And further, we see that there is an important correlation between the forcefulness and effectiveness of the struggle for peace, on the one hand, and the level of class consciousness and participation of the working class, on the other. Such facts cannot be explained if we view the struggle for peace as one which is above classes. This is an important matter, for behind it lies the question of what social forces will play the key, the leading role in the struggle for peace. Shall the ruling classes, for example, be the determining factor, the middle class, or the advanced working-class forces? Of course, we need to build the broadest kind of unity, but history has shown that the struggle for peace is most powerful when it is linked to the immediate, burning class needs of the most exploited and oppressed.
The promoters of “new thinking” wish to throw overboard class analysis in the sphere of international relations. They think in so doing they gain more flexibility in the struggle for peace. In reality, it is the imperialists whose capacity for maneuver is enhanced through the obscuring of the real source of the war danger.
The fact is that while imperialism’s options may be narrowing, its nature remains the same. As Lenin says, “Imperialism is, in general, a striving towards violence and reaction.” While seeking to avoid self-destruction, imperialism will in pursuit of its interests resort to whatever force it believes it may reasonably risk. And while there are important differences within imperialist circles concerning the parameters of that reasonable risk, and progressives are mindful of such differences and try to take full advantage of them, we cannot build a powerful peace movement if we are lulled into believing that imperialism is anything other than piratical and ready to seize upon any weakness and use any expedient means to impose its will. As was indicated before, the strength of the mass peace movement is closely related to its level of political consciousness. Therefore, anything which dims that consciousness, corrupts that consciousness, objectively weakens the struggle for peace, no matter what immediate diplomatic gains might appear to accrue from conciliationary language that varnishes the realities of imperialism’s aims and motive forces.
Yes, we approve of “de-ideologizing” interstate relations, if by that is meant primarily that the imperialists should rein in their fanatical class hatred of the socialist countries and pursue a course of peaceful coexistence, mutually beneficial economic relations, and cooperation in dealing with problems threatening the entire world. And on the socialist side, we would agree that it is necessary to struggle against ideological rigidities that prevent the fullest exploitation of possibilities to reduce tensions, to find allies in the capitalist camp and isolate imperialism’s most belligerent forces. In this connection, we note with approval and gratitude recent Soviet peace initiatives, including the announcement of unilateral disarmament measures. We naturally assume that the Soviet Union does not imperil itself or its allies by carrying out such measures.
But we condemn any efforts at political and ideological disarmament by the Soviet Union, for by its very nature, such disarmament assists in the political and ideological disarmament of the exploited and oppressed throughout the world, assists in their subjection to imperialist slavery. This political and ideological disarmament flows from a different interpretation of the de-ideologizing of interstate relations than the acceptable one put forth above. For do we really expect the imperialists to be guided by the interests of their own working people in formulating their foreign policy aims? The answer is plain. On the Soviet side, the cause of peace demands that it be guided by socialist ideology, by Marxist-Leninist ideology in the conduct of its foreign affairs, for only such an ideology consistently reflects the interests of the working people worldwide, the interests of humanity generally, including the people’s security interests. What is the alternative to being guided by Marxist-Leninist ideology? The alternative is pragmatism, a bourgeois ideology, whereby principle is sacrificed to the goal of immediate results, of expediency. Pragmatism, if practiced by the Soviet Union, would lead to appeasement, and we have seen the grim results of appeasement in this century in opening the doors to Fascist aggression.
De-ideologizing interstate relations, as put forward by a number of Soviet commentators, calls for a “balanced accommodation to the interests of all parties.” Although we realize that accommodations must be made to the realities of the world balance of forces, the power realities, it must be a principled accommodation. That kind of accommodation has nothing in common, however, with giving legitimacy to imperialist interests, acquiescing to the legitimacy of imperialist plunder and intimidation. Unfortunately, current discussion about the “balance of interests” in the Soviet Union is reminiscent of the old “spheres of influence” doctrine that dominated world politics for so long, and suggests abandonment of socialist internationalism and pursuit of a policy of conciliation of imperialism. For how does one balance the interests of the oppressor with the interests of the oppressed, the interests of the exploiter with the interests of the exploited, the interests of those seeking world domination with the interests of those fighting for national independence?
Does de-ideologizing interstate relations mean that the Soviet Union’s relations with socialist states will in no way differ from its relations with imperialist states?
The ruling class, however, can never act other than on the basis of capitalist ideology, that is, according to a system of belief in accord with its class interests. But through our struggles, the forces for peace and social progress can encourage that class to act on the basis of realism, to abandon policies fraught with risks of self-annihilation in a universal holocaust.
There is evidence today of the ruling class beginning to adapt its thinking to new realities. It is entirely possible – even probable – that imperialism will turn to new methods, and that waging nuclear war will be largely discarded as an option. This is a tremendous people’s victory, and we are profoundly grateful to the Soviet Union for its major contribution to this victory. Still, we must remain vigilant, for no matter how strong the anti-imperialist forces, and no matter to what degree the imperialists pursue reasonable policies at any given time, until imperialism itself is destroyed, there can never be a final elimination of the war threat.
While turning away from nuclear war, imperialism is stepping up its hegemonic drive. One can see this in the media’s coverage of the Soviet Union. While welcoming perestroika and glasnost, while admitting to the peaceful course of Soviet policy, the imperialist media is stepping up its slanderous depiction of Soviet life (as well as life in other socialist countries). It is interpreting Soviet pronouncements concerning glasnost and perestroika in a sense of Soviet admissions of the superiority of the capitalist system and its political forms. Of course, we expect nothing else from the imperialists. Unfortunately, certain Soviet leaders and spokespeople often do not clearly contradict such interpretations, and in fact sometimes even give the impression of confirming them.
Similarly, while we approve of the review of Soviet history taking place in Soviet society, and support appraisals based on truth, even though this may temporarily bring grist to the mill of imperialism, recognizing that this, too, is part of the price that must be paid for past errors, we are appalled by a growing tendency to turn such exposures into an orgy of denigration of the entire history of Soviet socialist construction and of Soviet foreign policy, and indirectly turning into an apologia for imperialism’s dastardly crimes.
We have said that we rejoice at the new Soviet peace initiatives which, while innovative in their boldness, do not represent a radical departure from the fundamentals of traditional Soviet foreign policy, which has remained constant since the Revolution. We remember the hundreds of proposals made over the years by the Soviet Government to reduce tensions, including calls for general and complete disarmament, the banning of atomic weapons, the creation of zones of peace, the signing of non-aggression treaties, substantial reductions in military budgets, etc. Yet one sometimes gets the impression from reading Soviet speeches and articles that the peace orientation of the Soviet Union is itself part of the “new thinking.” While such an implication may offer some tactical advantages, we believe it introduces confusion among the peoples, and in the long run creates serious problems for the movements for social progress and peace everywhere in the world.
Another symptom of the abandonment of the class principle in foreign policy is the putting forward by certain Soviet spokespeople and writers of the concept of “national interest” as the supreme consideration in the conduct of each country’s foreign policy, including that of the Soviet Union. Properly defined, we would have no difficulty with this concept. The problem is that in the imperialist world, national interest is defined by the ruling class as that which serves its interests, not that of the overwhelming majority of the people of that nation. In the socialist world, until recently, national interest has been defined in a way that links it with the cause of socialism and democracy worldwide. Now, however, there are indications of a different definition emerging, one that counterposes the Soviet national interest to socialist internationalism, anti-imperialist struggle, and support for the oppressed of the world.
A word about the phrase “new thinking” itself. One cannot object to the abandonment of ideological rigidities and dogmatism, as we have said. And Marxism-Leninism has always firmly opposed dogmatism. Marxism-Leninism itself is forever new thinking, for while it is an established theoretical treasure-trove embodying the whole of human history, it is inextricably linked to ever-changing reality, testing itself always on contemporary practice. That is how Marx, Engels and Lenin developed their theory, and that is how their conscientious followers have continually enriched that theory.
At the same time, we are quite familiar with revisionist trends in the working-class movement which have always used the novelty of their contemporary situation – and no situation ever exactly duplicates what precedes it – to call for abrogating the principles of the Marxist-Leninist theoretical legacy. Opportunists are perennially calling for “new thinking,” which reduces itself to adapting to momentary, transient considerations for short-term benefits, and betraying the working people’s long-term and fundamental interests. That kind of “new thinking,” being rooted in ephemera, ages very quickly.
To proceed to the November 1988 issue of International Affairs, the official Soviet foreign policy Journal, in the lead article, “Confidence and the Balance of Interests,” Andrei V. Kozyrev lays out theses which are clearly inimical to Marxism-Leninism and clearly distort history in the manner typical of imperialist politicians and historians. We do not single out Kozyrev because of his special importance, but because his article typifies the fare served up by the exponents of the “new thinking.”
Kozyrev begins by attributing some measure of blame for the Cold War on “Stalinism,” and specifically “Stalinism’s suspiciousness,” its “lack of faith in its own people,” which caused the imperialists to be “frightened.” We find this explanation for Western hostility, aggression and scheming against the first socialist state absolutely incredible. As a matter of fact, the West did not and to this day does not have any difficulty in entertaining cordial relations with barbaric dictatorships, from South Africa to Israel, including El Salvador, Chile, South Korea, etc., that have “lacked faith in its own people.” Not only has the West not waged a Cold War against these regimes, but they have propped them up politically and economically and bolstered them militarily. It was not Stalin’s repressive policies that antagonized the capitalist West. It was the fact that a state was being organized along socialist principles, in the people’s interest, on behalf of their needs, without exploitation. Stalin could have slaughtered half the population, and if he had been useful to imperialism, the Western governments would have had no trouble in supporting him, just as they supported the genocidal Pol Pot.
If Kozyrev had said that the deformations of democracy under Stalin assisted the imperialists in confusing the masses and thereby weakened the struggle for peace, then there would have not been any argument. But Kozyrev did not say that Mr. Kozyrev goes on to speak about “balancing class interests in the international arena,” which is the central theme of his article. This is contrasted with what Mr. Kozyrev calls the “simplistic” perspective of the irreconcilable nature of the struggle between capitalism and socialism. Thus, responsibility for the present confrontation between the imperialist and socialist states is laid, at least in part, at the doorstep of what Kozyrev considers ossified thinking by socialists, although he admits that those who accept the view of class struggle as the driving force in international relations believe, nevertheless, that such struggle is entirely consistent with peaceful coexistence.
Further, says Kozyrev, the Soviet Union has “let itself get involved in the arms race” by “pursuing the logic of the anti-imperialist struggle.” And Kozyrev claims that the Soviet leadership after Lenin “cultivated distrust of imperialism,” and blames Soviet leadership for past failures to create an anti-Fascist front and for blaming “all world evils on the US military-industrial complex.”
Summing up, then, responsibility for world tension, the East-West confrontation, the arms race, the Cold War, must be shared between the imperialists and a) Stalinist suspiciousness; b) the application of the Marxist theory of class struggle in international relations; and c) anti-imperialism.
Here we see parroting of the same old imperialist themes, themes which are becoming more and more discredited with world public opinion, even in the imperialist countries. How, then, is it that these themes are now taken up by a Deputy Director of the International Organizations Department of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs?
Kozyrev wishes to demonstrate that there are realistic possibilities of establishing qualitatively new and positive relations between the socialist and capitalist countries. This is entirely conceivable within the framework of Marxist-Leninist analysis. But Kozyrev has his own methods. He wishes to prove his case by varnishing the realities of the contemporary economic and political situation in the imperialist countries. He tries to minimize the enormous economic weight of the military-industrial complex, and the political weight of the almost $300 billion, for example, set aside annually in the US budget to feed that complex, ignores the stake of finance capital generally in the war budget, ignores the usefulness of the military in protecting the enormous interests of imperialism worldwide, involving the interests of the most important transnational corporations, including those not normally included under the heading “military-industrial complex.” Kozyrev claims that the military-industrial complex only represents one section of capital and that the State represents the entire capitalist class. He forgets that history is replete with examples of state power being dominated by representatives of only one particular section of the ruling class, in which the other sections are forced to play a subordinate role.
We are here not implying that it is impossible to defeat the most aggressive, war-minded and war economy- related sections of the ruling class, but this is not going to be accomplished by belittling the magnitude of the problem. I am reminded of attempts by bourgeois professors and the bourgeois media to prove-wrong Lenin’s underscoring of the importance of capital export in defining the new imperialist system. They pointed to the fact that export capital was a very small portion of the large capitalist states’ aggregate capital, ignoring that it was the most economically dynamic and politically decisive section.
We are told by Kozyrev that business interests abroad can be secured “these days” with a “minimum of reliance on the military and arm twisting techniques.” Again, this not only flies in the face of current reality – the sordid record of imperialism’s violence and intimidation – but contradicts the laws of the motive forces of imperialism which are inhibited only by countervailing power, namely, the strength of imperialism’s international adversaries and the political strength of democratic forces worldwide, including imperialism’s domestic opposition.
Given that imperialism is by definition predatory, its tendency to use force is inherent. How does one begin to answer Kozyrev’s assertion that, “It is all the more strange to speak of the irreconcilability of interests of states with different social systems now that even class conflicts within capitalist countries are being waged…not in fierce confrontational forms but predominantly through compromises reached within the framework of mutually recognized legality.”
Now we have the “balance of interests” operating between classes within the capitalist countries:
In the first place, the use of force by the capitalist state internally is routine, even in the “freest” capitalist country. In the US, for example, we experience no shortage of police violence in the ghettos, no shortage of actions by all branches of government arbitrarily curtailing the rights of the working people. If the working-class resistance to corporate and governmental assaults on their well-being, if the African-American and Latino resistance to growing genocidal conditions has not reached a level to trigger as yet the kind of violence typical of capital governments in Israel, South Africa, El Salvador, Guatemala, etc„ it is only because the economic and political crisis in the imperialist states has not yet attained the level of its periphery. The legal order, supposedly guiding the class struggle, is not the product of some kind of “mutual recognition” but is imposed upon the working people by the monopolies, which nevertheless has not inhibited the monopolies from ignoring even its own legal order when it deems it convenient.
Is it not embarrassing to be required to point this out to someone who has a responsible political position in a country where these truths have been generally recognized as elementary for over half a century?
Kozyrev qualifies his conclusions about capital’s respect for legality by adding that the capitalists resort to violence “only as a last resort,” this “only” being quite amusing. The ruling class resorts to violence “only” when it has to and when it can get away with it. That is why the working people must mobilize against the use of such violence, must work to make the political consequences of the use of force as counterproductive to the ruling class as possible. But certainly such mobilization cannot occur on the basis of lulling illusions about the pacific nature of the imperialist beast. Kozyrev tries to marshal arguments as to why it is that anti-imperialist struggle is obsolete. He has begun, as we have stated, by laying a portion of the blame on socialism for the East-West confrontation, has continued by denying that international affairs is driven by the class struggle, has portrayed modern-day imperialism as eminently reasonable, pursuing the class struggle at home according to the rules of the Marquis of Queensberry, employing force “only as a last resort.” And now he adds another ground. Since “no class or stratum of Soviet society is subjected to exploitation by foreign capital,” says Kozyrev, and “since internal renewal of socialism is the only way of solving its problems,” then anti-imperialism is anachronistic. How muddled, then, was Lenin who also faced tasks of revolutionary socialist transformation of his country, whose economy had been withdrawn from direct imperialist exploitation, but who nevertheless saw anti-imperialist struggle as a fundamental need and obligation of the Soviet republics
The Land of Socialism has never known a moment of peace from imperialist attack, from one quarter or another – if not military, then political and economic. If imperialism cannot wage a frontal assault at any given time on the socialist countries, then it attempts to subvert them, at least it wages a propaganda war against them. We are not indifferent, of course, to the forms of struggle waged by imperialism against socialism. But while we struggle to limit the scope of imperialist attack, to narrow its range of options, to force it to abandon violent means, we know that imperialism will never reconcile itself to socialism, the socialist movement anywhere, nor existing socialism anywhere. Kozyrev, however, finds it “strange” to speak of the irreconcilability of interests of states with different social systems, strange that the imperialists would view socialism as a threat to their interests, a threat to their neocolonial plunder and a threat to their class rule at home.
Now that Kozyrev has “proved” that there is no reason for waging an anti-imperialist struggle on the part of the Soviet Union, he proceeds to try to establish the same thing with regard to the developing countries. Kozyrev, trying to be clever, I suppose, states that the “developing countries…are suffering not so much from capitalism as from its shortage.” Here capital and capitalism are considered synonymous. The former colonies, says Kozyrev, “are not interested in confrontation with their former mother countries but in cooperation in safeguarding their own and international stability.” Spoken like a true neocolonialist! The real choice is not between cooperation and confrontation but between servitude and relations of equality. But according to Kozyrev, neocolonial pillage, political diktat and military intimidation are purely an invention of the old dogmatists.
It is true that the governments of many former colonies are collaborating with a new form of colonial subordination, a collaboration which finds expression in acceptance of IMF-dictated policies which are despoiling their economies and bringing ruin to the masses of their people. Such governments frequently are composed of or serve comprador social strata. But even these governments have, with virtual unanimity, proclaimed themselves victims of imperialist plunder, have called for relief from extortionate debt, demanding fairer terms of trade, for a new economic order.
Kozyrev refers to “leftist” states in Asia and Africa. Those are the states, presumably, who wage a consistently anti-imperialist struggle. These states are unfavorably compared by Kozyrev with the “trend for stepping up economic development by participating in the international division of labor.” No one today has the option of not participating in the international division of labor. What Kozyrev in his conceptual sleight-of-hand attempts to dodge is the fundamental question of what the nature of the international division of labor should be. Should it follow the international division of labor set up by the imperialists that is resulting in increasing misery in the majority of Third World nations, a division of labor based on subordination and dependency, or should a division of labor be created based on genuine interdependence, relations of equality and mutual benefit?
Kozyrev continues his attack on the “Leftist” states, which he characterizes as “regimes that declare themselves progressive but far from always boast a sufficient democratic basis in their own countries.” Now that he has finished discrediting these “Leftist” states, he calls for “new thinking” with regard to defending them from imperialist attack. Kozyrev calls for “restraint” in choosing the means, especially military means, in coming to their aid. Such restraint Kozyrev links to the Leninist principle of the non-export of revolution. “The revolution must know how to defend itself primarily by its own forces and above all by non-military means.” Kozyrev continues, “Long outdated are the views according to which any clashes between advanced Western states and developing nations were looked at primarily through the prism of ‘suppressing’ national liberation aspirations…More often than not /such conflicts/ require solutions with due regard for the interests of both sides. Anti-imperialism is a poor counselor in matters related to improving the situation in the world as a whole.”
“Finally,” says Kozyrev, “there is a need to readjust stereotyped perceptions concerning the desire of the• imperialist centers for all-out plundering of newly-free nations.” Kozyrev assures us that “Lenin stressed that, unlike its undeveloped forms, advanced capitalism is not interested in deception but in ‘honest’ profits from trade and economic transactions.”
And all of the above is said to be ‘not a matter of concessions to imperialism or retreat to reserve positions in order to minimize losses or to muster forces.” Would that it were, we can at least understand the necessity of retreat when compelled by necessity. We can understand a situation where the Soviet Union, lacking the wherewithal to provide support for various forces battling imperialism, needs to reduce or withdraw previous economic support. We can understand reducing military support for the same reasons. But when a rationale for such retreat is couched in arguments which serve as an apology for imperialism, which places the struggle of developing countries for economic and political independence on the same plane as the predatory conduct of imperialism, which blames the progressive developing countries for the imperialist-backed contra movements, pointing to a supposed lack of democracy (and we know that the imperialists support the contra movements precisely because there is too much democracy in those developing countries), then Soviet conduct which is placed on the foundation of these arguments indeed becomes suspect.
We would stress that so far such arguments have not emanated, to our knowledge, from the top leadership of the Soviet Union. The question is what weight are we to ascribe to them when they are found in the organ of the Soviet Foreign Ministry?
The Soviet Union’s interests in developing countries, according to Kozyrev, should be “predicated above all on the actual possibilities for building mutually beneficial economic and technical cooperation.” The peoples of the world, apparently, should be of interest only as commercial partners. We have to say that Comrade Kozyrev might well be placed in a Soviet import/export organization, but as a foreign policy ideologist, he is a disaster! “From this /commercial/ perspective, Kozyrev goes on, “the interests of Western countries are indubitably broader and deeper.” (Wolfish interests, we would say.) “Therefore,” says Kozyrev, “we should not try to match the Western military presence in those areas of greater Western interests.” Perhaps not, but should not the Soviet Union and its allies wage a struggle together with the peoples of the threatened regions to be rid of Western military pressures?
It only remains for Kozyrev to give a new coat of paint to imperialism’s internal political mechanisms. “Bourgeois democracy,” says Kozyrev, “possesses tremendous potential that has already turned into something of a classic of political thinking and practice,..This is the most valuable part of common human culture which, as Lenin said, we ought to study, appreciate and master.”
Once again, Lenin’s name is invoked in quotations taken out of context or even faked to assert that which Lenin condemned and fought against all his political life. We would recommend to Kozyrev that he re-read, if he ever read them, Lenin’s classic works, “State and Revolution” and “The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegate Kautsky,” where bourgeois democracy even in the “freest” republics is described by Lenin as democracy for the rich, and where its hypocritical essence is exquisitely exposed.
So ends the lead article of the November 1988 International Affairs.
Postscript: On January 7, 1989, the Op Ed page of the New York Times carried a brief excerpt of the Kozyrev article under the title, “Why Soviet Foreign Policy Went Sour.” In the introductory paragraph, the Times writes, “As a featured article, according to American experts on the Soviet Union, it carried the imprimatur-of top officials, including the Foreign Minister, Eduard A. Shevardnadze.”
The same issue of International Affairs contains another article by two Soviet research workers, Nikolai Volkov and Vladimir Popov, Institute of the USA and Canada, Academy of Sciences, which perhaps reaches a new low within the magazine as an apology for imperialism. One cannot speak any longer of distortion of Marxism-Leninism but rather of its outright rejection. In the article the readers are bombarded ad nauseam with the benefits of the new international division of labor. Neocolonialism is depicted as the mere fancy of dogmatists, and we are treated to a virtual panegyric to imperialism. The relations between the West and the Third World are characterized as that of “partnership and rivalry” – in other words, relations of equality.
It would take a pamphlet to fulfill the task of refuting the flood of historical, economic and political distortions that permeate this work. There are claims made in this article that even liberal bourgeois writers would be ashamed to assert. As a matter of fact, there is a substantial body of bourgeois thought that now rings the alarm bells concerning the economic crisis in the Third World, the crushing debt, inequitable terms of trade, the absence of prospects for development, the Western political and military support for the most reactionary ruling forces within developing countries who are preventing solutions to those countries’ critical problems, the depredations of the IMF, etc,
Given the highly favorable characterization of imperialist relations with the Third World, should we then be surprised that Messrs. Volkov and Popov conclude with a call for, among other things, the joint financing of major projects in the developing countries by the Soviet Union and Western countries, the CMEA and the EEC, etc.? Given the tenor of the authors’ previous pro-imperialist analysis, is this not in reality a call for joint exploitation with the West of the Third World?
What all these currents of “new thinking” lead to can be seen in the piece appearing in the Op Ed page of the New York Times of December 27, 1988, written by Dimitri K. Simes, a senior consultant of one of the two principal “think tanks” on foreign policy of the US ruling class, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
It would seem, according to Mr. Simes, that the end of the Cold War is at hand. But this will not usher in a new era of peace, but rather increased violence and increased insecurity, if Mr. Simes’s recommendations get government support. The end of the Cold War means, according to Simes “gaining a greater latitude for unilateral uses of America’s power against those who consider its interests easy prey.” It means “ending the manipulation of America by third world nations, which have exploited Soviet-American animosity to get greater assistance from both superpowers.” It “puts America in a stronger bargaining position vis-a-vis defiant third world debtors.” “Paradoxically,” says Simes, “the Soviet-American rapprochement makes military power more useful as a United States foreign policy instrument.” As an example, “The Sandinistas and their Cuban sponsors would be bound to become a little nervous over Mr. Gorbachev’s potential reaction if America finally lost patience with their mischief.”
