Arms talks collapse No tears from Nato as Reagan cruises on

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Commonwealth summit — but ed on October 26.

FEW will have been convinced by President Reagan's геhearsed statement of "disappointment" at the Soviet walk-out from the Geneva talks on European nuclear missiles.

By deploying the first of the 572 Cruise and Pershing missiles in Britain, Germany and Italy, Reagan has taken a step towards strengthening NATO's nuclear superiority in Europe and at the same time has wrong-footed the Kremlin bureaucrats.

Despite the endlessly repeated claims by Thatcher and other European cold-warriors that the new US missiles were simply a lever to force the USSR into talks on disarmament, it was never possible that this escalation of the arms race could do Cruise and Pershing are first strike weapons - the one a lethal low-level missile, the other a high accuracy, high speed ballistic missile, basically a rocket-propelled artillery ments have in the main hel shell - which were planned and firm against the peace move developed long before the Soviet ment, and tied themselves eve deployment of SS20 missiles. more slavishly to the USA an SS20s have only a slightly its nuclear are Geneva „o „oce cocov longer range than the SS4 and SS5 that they are replacing: they aborted, and the Soviet delegs are far less accurate than Cruise on carrying the immedia and Pershing; and they are not blame for it, there is no long first strike weapons. any clear focus for the mor The triple-warhead SS20s timid NATO leaders to press fo represent an increase in war- concessions or negotiations heads but an actual reduction in and the US strategists wh Soviet missiles deployed against Dream ot being able to fi NATO - they were an attempt Vorld War 3 mainly if not sol in the late 1970s to redress a in urope. after the models of long-standing imbalance of Soviet nuclear forces as against another step towares thei NATO. • •ecave When Reagan, Thatcher and other warmongers sought to leaders in the Kremlin, how justify the new US missiles by ever the nek-out was er gestur calling for a "zero option" in which deployment of Cruise and strength.

Pershing would be abandoned in exchange for a dismantlement of called, and the Soviet Union wil SS20s, they knew that they were need to finance and politicall demanding the impossible; an prepare the installation of it acceptance by the Soviet Union own new missiles in Easterr of a long-term, consolidated Europe and deploy additiona nuclear inferiority in Europe. submarine and ship-basec We should remember that nuclear weaponry targeted al NATO was founded on the basis the USA. of a strategy involving first use of nuclear weapons — a strategy weaponry to new bases in East. it still holds to this day. ern Europe will intensify pres.

But by using the "zero sures already evident within the option" propaganda ploy, the Warsaw Pact, where creaking NATO hardliners knew that they bureaucratically distorted would be assured of a pretext to economies are already straining force ahead with deployment, to sustain existing military regardless of the USSR. budgets and - certainly in And they also calculated that Poland - contain working class once the new US missiles were opposition. installed, the Soviet bureaucracy would be forced to take its invisible President and Party damaging steps to retaliate - leader, will find it hard to bott walking out at Geneva and carry through these moves anc deploying their own additional retain its cultivated image as a missiles handing fresh 'peace-loving' leadership. exploitable propaganda to the The reality is that behind their NATO chiefs and confusing and talk of 'peace' lurks the brutal demoralising sections of the repression of vicious military peace movement in Europe. regimes, which will use the most THE appointment of a pliable the bureaucrat selected to head team of benevolent Englishmen, the stooge administration, Sir businessmen and selected Gre- Alastair McIntyre, has backed nadian Uncle Toms to hold the out of the job. Other nominees fort after Reagan's invasion of are apparently concerned that Grenada has proved more diffi- they will have little if any power cult than at first imagined. or influence — while the island will remain for the foreseeable Not only has the invasion future under American control: continued to inflame the anger there are still as many troops on of Third World rulers - not Grenada now as there were least the Afriçan leaders at the when the cease-fire was declar. Sir Paul Scoon (left) with US goon Now, delighted that the scheme has worked, these war chiefs are also relieved to see European NATO governtalk Reagan has successfully increased NATO m horrific nuclear hardware to PE preserve their own balance of stric terror with the imperialist thou Wars One and Two, have taken governments of the West. have • Yet Soviet bureaucrats milit remain at the same time wedded comI For the increasingly decrepi to counterrevolutionary East strategy of "peaceful coexis- neve tence" which in practice assists USA Tawe i in preserving capitalist rule and chair imperialist oppression across relia Their bluff has now beer the majority of the earth's area!

surface. Japa The ageing veterans of unde Stalin's purge era who now hold ment the helm in the Kremlin pose no Rij threat to bourgeois rule in move Western Europe; and evidence inter. of their reluctance to support dragi radical and anti-imperialist possi The spread of Soviet nuclea movements or push for any ialist overturn of capitalism can be seen in the agonising insecurity of the regimes of Nicaragua, Angola and Mozambique, all of which are under fire from counter-revolutionary guerrillas which could be decisively crushed with Soviet backing.

The Soviet bureaucracy, with WI war-c threa econc for cl the SI revol the I burea Thi mobil class which never poker clear superiority urtly as a result of this tly limited approach, gh the Stalinist leaders • massively enlarged the ¡ary machine under their mand in the USSR and ern Europe, they have ir held any equivalent to the in terms of a world-wide • of military bases and ble outposts in strategic s. Reagan's recent visit to n and South Korea helped rline this important elet of US global superiority. ght now the workers' ement and the working class nationally has been ged a little nearer to ible extinction by the imperand Stalinist leaders.

rile opposing the NATO Irive and every military t against the nationalised ›mies of East Europe, Asia Cuba, workers must fight lass action independent of talinist leaders, for socialist ution in the West, and for political overthrow of the incracies of the East. is is one reason why the lisation of the working is one bargaining chip • Yuri Andropov would •dare throw in to his global 'game with Reagan.

A REPORT presented by the Temnararu Recinnal Commiosion 'Hutmen' la metal production plant with a workforce of more than 4,000) in Wroclaw, based on information and financial statements from the Temporary Factory Commission (TKZ) and the Strike Committee, states that:

*Approximately 80% of union members have been paying union dues — ranging from 50 to 1,000 zl per month - since the introduction of the state of war. Payment of dues was standardised at 200zl monthly in early 1983.

*Between December 1981 and April 1982 90% of the funds stirrin........ idiotta