Bring the coffins home! defend Araentina. Don't single

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THE most appalling hypo- military tradition in Britain crisy was revealed this to bury the dead where week on the Falklands they fell - this is particucrisis when Field Marshall larly so given the economic Carver stated: ''The bodies climate"

be brought back to Britain been spent sending them "It has always been the even be bothered to have Thatcher wouldn't be there if the rest didn't support her of dead soldiers cannot at tax payers' expense. I AM writing to complain about the headline of Socialist Organiser 86, the picture on the front page and the poster in the middle of the paper.

My objection is not against the politics of Socialist Organiser but against the way that the war in the South Atlantic has been personalised into one woman's fight against the Argies.

The headline of the paper was 'Thatcher's Bloodbath' The front page picture was of a grotesque Thatcher with a big nose, big teeth and big breasts, sailing along on the body of a dead man (no big breasts for him).

The poster in the centre is no better. It shows Thatcher with the body of an animal and 'Dracula' like teeth.

Where are the rest of the Tory Party? Thatcher is their leader, but she wouldn't be there if the rest of the party NONE Be::O JuGE 10:0 So whilst millions have there, the Tories couldn't didn't support her. The war is not going on just because of her, but because of the Tory Party (not to mention the Labour Party).

To show pictures of a deformed Thatcher, with enormous breasts only encourages sexism and hatred of women in politics. How many pictures do you see of Norman Tebbit with a big penis, playing on the fact that he is a man?

She shouldn't be attacked because she is a woman, but for the politics she represents.

This isn't just a fault of SO. It is spread throughout the labour movement with slogans like 'Ditch the Bitch' and 'Plunderwoman' '. The left are supposed to be liberating women, so why not start with not printing sexist pictures and slogans?

In sisterhood, KATE WILLIAMS IT" them brought coffins.

Vietnam

During the Vietnam war one of the main demands of the "Bring the Boys Home Campaign" was for the dead to be brought back to THERE IS quite a strong connection between Zealand and the Falklands. Some people estimate that there are as many as 500 ex-Falklanders living here, and a letter recently received by one from a relative in Port Stanley gives an interesting picture of the islanders' views.

"Yes, I guess you would be worried. We were pretty scared ourselves in fact.

'We were up all night waiting for them (the argentines) to arrive and then lay on the floor for three hours with bullets and mortars banging everywhere.

'Certainly I have never been so scared in my life at any time. I was sure we were going to die. And as it was, a mortar bomb landed in the yard and showered lots of metal all over the house and we have some bits of metal to show for it. Nothing found a home in anything valuable, luckily.

''But I don't think I want to go back over that again. But the British Fleet will be here soon and I suppose if anything it will be worse.

'We have been told what to do in case of an air raid. But if the British are mad enough to bomb the place I'll be surprised.

'Certainly we are" more. bothered about the British then about the Argentines at present."

HARRY HOLLAND, Wellington, New Zealand FOR years now, there has been concern that lead from petrol may result in impaired mental ability and behavioural problems in children living close to motorways. Although, in some parts of the USA, Australia, Sweden and Japan, this worry • has resulted in the banning of lead additives from petrol, the idea has been poohpoohed in this country.

In 1980, a government working party chaired by Professor P.J. Lawther advised that the evidence which suggested that even low blood lead levels were harmful was inconclusive (it is well-known that high levels of lead are very toxic indeed).

The Lawther working party also concluded that, in any case, most of the body's lead came from food and water, not petrol. Nevertheless, last year, the government cut the legal level of lead in petrol from 0.4 to 0.15 milligrams Der the States.

The arrivals of the cof fins had a tremendor Isly radicalising effect on the civilian population - the arrival of hundreds of coffins really brought the reality of war home to ordinary folk.

WHILST supporting Socialist Organiser's position of refusing to line up with either Thatcher or Galtieri in the present Falklands dispute, I would like to express my disagreement with the argument repeatedly advocated in Socialist Organiser that, should the fighting spread to Argentina itself and thereby threaten its "territorial integrity" , socialists should call for a victory for Argentina.

Predatory

As SO has pointed out: Argentina is not a "typical third world oppressed country". It is an exporter of capital, a predatory power with territorial ambitions other than the Falklands (e.g. Beagle Islands), it intervenes in the internal affairs of other Latin American countries leg. El Salvador, Bolivia), and it is destined to play a central role in the proposed South Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

In war between (decaying) imperialist power (Britain) and a sub-imperialist power (Argentina) what basis is there for socialists to call for a victory for the latter? Socialists should be working for the defeat of both sides by l independent, international working class action.

Historical analogies are always of limited use. In some cases (mis-) interpretations of them can be completely misleading. The muddle-heads who deduce support for Argenng litre* Now, at an international conterence organised in London two weeks ago by the Campaign for LeadFree Air (CLEAR), several researchers produced evidence which goes directly against the conclusions of the Lawther Report. Firstly, a group of Italian scientists (using the fact that lead in petrol in one region of Italy has a different proportion of unusual isotopes from lead in soil and food), found that 30% of lead in the blood comes from petrol.

And in California, in the four years after lead was banned from petrol, blood lead levels fell by a third Secondly, psychologists from both the USA and Britain (including two members of Professor Lawther's committee) have found new evidence for a link between even low blood lead levels labove 120 micrograms* per litre) and inabilits to incenin order to shift the public mood towards Thatcher's war drive and bring it home what the war is really JOHNNYRENO, Stockport tine in the present Falklands squabble from brief asides made by Trotsky in relation to a hypothetical war between Britain and Brazil half a century ago provide the clearest and most immediate proof of this.

But an analogy with the Menshevik arguments in the 1914-18 war does serve a purpose. The Mensheviks argued for support for the Russian war effort on the grounds that Russia was a dependent economy, subject to control by the major European powers (cf the arguments now circulating tti WHEN I started work at Bridgeports, a machine tools factory in Leicester, morale - and wages - were very low.

But after a successful strike. in March for bonus money, we have a regularlymeeting stewards' committee and a mandate for the stewards to try and put more money from that bonus onto the basic rates in the annual pay negotiations.

A year ago the union (AUEW) had only 30% membership. There was a reluctant convenor, three stewards, no regular stewards* meetings, and no proper communication with the shop floor.

When the 39 hour week came, we still had to produce the same as in 40. And then with falling orders we were put on a 4 day week (some sections 3 days), with le d by Davy Jones and Je trate, nervous tension, and lowered performance in IQ tests.

The brunt of airborne lead polution is carried by working class communities in inner-city areas. As a consequence, there must be some doubt as to whether the effects attributed to lead are not instead the result of social deprivation, so that lead is a coincidental, not a causal factor in affecting abiilty and behaviour. (The dangers of ignoring this possibility are best illustrated by the assertions of Reading's Professor Bryce-Smith that last year's riots were in some way due to lead pollution!)

Despite this reservation, Professor Michael Rutter, an educational psychologist, and another member of the Lawther Committee, commented that he was now in favour of the elimination of lead from petrol since "the level of probability lof an association Dear S.0, about Argentine "dependence"). Lenin ruthlessly combatted such pernicious arguments.

Instead of joining • the Mensheviks as a recruiting agent for the Tsar, he worked to transform the imperialist war into civil war.

Groups like Socialist Challenge have already put themselves in the camp of latter-day Menshevism by lining up with Argentina and ascribing a "progressive content" to Galtieri's reactionary invasion of the Falklands.

(Like the curate's egg, it seems, the military dicta1g orga redundancies. After losing 8 hours' work and bonus payments, our wages were halved.

I got myself elected as a shop steward, and started recruiting workers into the AUEW. The reason why they hadn't joined before was not the myth that the unions are too militant, but the fact that they couldn't see the union doing anything. Join and fight the union leadership and management together, was my answer.

Soon membership was 50%.

On Tuesday afternoon March 30, 98% of the factory stopped work over the bonus money. Management refused to negotiate because we were out of procedure. Ine next morning we stopped work again.

The union district secretary, Bridget Paton, did not On y Ben-Noah between lead and lowered intelligence) is such that I •think it is worth acting upon.

The Labour Party NEC last month pledged that the next Labour govetnment would ban lead from petrol. With the medical establishment of the British Medical Association also convinced of the adverse psychological effects of lead in petrol, and with the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution launching an investigation into lead, it seems that we shall eventually see lead-free petrol in Britain, though several years after its prohibition in Australia, Sweden, Japan and the USA.

Cooperate

Since even the oil companies which jointly own Associated Octel, suppliers of tetra-ethyl lead additives for petrol, say that they will cooperate with the government if it bans lead after We invite readers to send us their letters, up to a usual maximum length of 400 words. Send to Socialist Organiser, c/o 28. Middle Lane. London N8. torship is "good in parts"

- just like Khomeini in Iran, fake 'trade unions' in Eastern Europe, etc. etc).

Basing itself on Lenin's struggle against the Mensheviks, and extending the logic already applied to reach its position on the current conflict, SO should draw the conclusion that a thorough-going revolutionary defeatist position must be maintained against both Britain and Argentina, even if the scene of the fighting were to shift to Argentina.

STAN CROOKE, Glasgow nised want to know. Pressure was put on me from management and from the convenor to advise the workers to go back on the grounds that I did not know the procedure.

I said I knew the procedure, but the workforce was on strike, and there was nothing I could or would do about it!

After another stoppage on the Wednesday we won approximately £10 guaranteed bonus until the May pay deal.

And we also got five new shop stewards elected, more workers joined the So the lesson for all workers is: organise and fight, don't be put off by backward-looking, well-paid full-time officials. We now have a base to work on for future organisation - and that's the crucial question.

AUEW steward, Leicester all, fuel consumption will increase a little), the only remaining opposition the government itself.

They argue that the costs of increased fuel expenditure, together with the technical improvements that car manufacturers woula have to carry out, makes lead-free petrol too expensive a proposition.

In other words, lead-free petrol could be the straw that breaks the back of the British motor industry.

In the meantime, the costs of keepng lead in petrol will be paid for, not by Ford and Leyland, but by the next generation of working class kids.

Of course, if lead is banned from petrol, then their parents may have to pay for it with their jobs. That's capitalism, comrades, that's capitalism.

*A milligram is one thousanth of a gramme. A microgram is one millionth of a gram.

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Socialist Organiser, Thursday 10 June 1982 Page 13 has Tribune been afflicted by infantile m Britai breach of UN Charter. •I fear for Tribune , plug - that Britain is in MAy 2º *982 bach pape VOL 46 NO 21 Michael Foot writes: How the ires Never for long dors i are pull-l John Gittings argues Falklands crisis:

TRIBUNE VOL de No 22 : JUNE 4. 1042 Tribune

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ad on lead. SCIENCE

We should be campaign- ing for this demand today