“The aim we set of the winning of political power by the working people is based on a perspective of peace, not war. The maintenance of world peace creates the most favourable conditions for the people to advance in the speediest way to the ending of capitalist class rule and the establishment of people’s power.
To live in peace; to know that it is a lasting peace—this is perhaps the greatest victory of all that Socialism has to offer. “(H. Pollitt. Twenty-Second Congress of the Communist Party)
Critics claim that the program denies the inevitability of war under imperialism.
This is not correct.
Program does not do this.
Program denies the inevitability of the third world war that is being prepared by the USA against the Soviet Union. Program calls upon all to act against the preparation of this particular war, and declares that this particular war is not inevitable. This particular war that is being organised by the USA, and under its leadership by firstly and mostly the UK and then by France, Italy, Spain, West Germany, Japan, and others (Norway, Sweden, Finland, Turkey, etc., etc.), can be stopped.
The simple fact that the program is talking of a particular war danger and a particular struggle against it clearly proves that the program and its writers do not deny the inevitability of war under imperialism, on the contrary they are very much aware of this tendency of imperialism and are fighting against one concrete example of its manifestation and they are doing all they can, as communists must do, to stop it being realised, to stop it becoming a real war at that juncture, at that moment in history.
To say that it is impossible to stop a particular war danger from becoming a reality, from becoming a real war is utterly and totally reactionary. In the name of sounding revolutionary and radical it is in fact spreading out and out pacifism.
Any policy that in the name of being revolutionary opposes this policy of the program, inevitably declares that this particular war being organised by the USA is unavoidable. This approach undermines the anti-war policy of the program and the practical fight that need to be organised against that particular war. And yet such an organisation of struggle for peace against this particular war danger was a duty for all the communist parties of the time, and indeed for any party that had a tiny piece of humanity left in them!
Such an approach opposes the fight for peace, thus supports war mongers and their war preparations and thus it is out and out reactionary.
This should be clear to all who loves peace and opposes war. This should be especially clear to all the critics who are declaring this particular war to be unavoidable, inevitable, that the war in question is being organised by the USA and its allies, it is a war that is being organised against the USSR, against the camp of peace and democracy organised around USSR.
One has to ask whom and what political tendencies would want such a war, and thus declare it to be unavoidable!
1.1: Anti war laws of the USSR!
First World War, and especially the Second World War has clearly proved that modern war is inevitably total war-that the separation of civilians from the soldiers, making war only amongst the soldiers is impossible.
Lately, there has been a study of civilian and soldier casualties of different wars. The tendency that more and more civilians are killed as the war becomes more and more contemporary is clearly revealed in this study. In Second World War the ratio of civilians killed as opposed to the soldiers killed is already more than %50. In Vietnam war it is more than %70, in Iraq war it is more than % 90.
When the war is imposed on them the communists do their best to avoid harming the civilian population, none combatants, but even they cannot avoid this, it is utterly, totally imposable to avoid! If one wants to talk of unavoidable, this is it!
In the case of war makers, in the case of war mongers, they are out and out criminals and cannot be bothered with such niceties even when they claim that they are taking care not to kill civilians.
You cannot nuke a city and claim you are going out of your way to avoid civilian casualties! You cannot threaten to do so and claim you are going out of your way to avoid civilian casualties.
You cannot “bomb them to stone age” and claim you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. Let us face it. As well as being a liar, you are also a mass murderer!
You cannot use Agent Orange, you cannot use depleted uranium, etc., etc., and claim that you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. You are a mass murderer!
You cannot send your soldiers straight into a city with modern weaponry “to take out the insurgents” and claim that you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. You are a mass murderer!
You cannot bomb houses “insurgent leaders are staying at” and weddings “organised by them” and claim that you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. You are a mass murderer!
You cannot assassinate people engaged in democratic struggle for peace and independence and a decent life in their thousands and claim that you are not waging a war and that you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. You are a mass murderer!
You cannot impose sanctions right left and centre and leave a city, indeed a country without electricity, clean water, rubbish collection, sewage clearance, food and medication and claim that you are not waging a war and that you are trying to avoid civilian casualties. You are a mass murderer!
Such examples are many and varied.
It is thus that USSR has declared not only making of war under modern conditions, but also propagating of war under modern conditions, and we are talking 1952 here, as a major crime against humanity!
Does this legal act of the USSR declare that war under imperialism is “not inevitable”?
Is this legal act of USSR the most revolutionary act humanity ever achieved or is it “reactionary”?
One should not wonder as to why it is that United Nations that is dominated by USA and UK, European Union which is dominated by Germany and France (and of course USA and UK), Japan dominated by USA and present day Russia, and the infamous G20 and indeed all the bourgeois and feudal states join hands in hiding this law from the peoples of the world, as to why they cannot declare that propagating and making of war is a crime against humanity?
Nevertheless, the fact remains as it did since 1952, since this law became a law of the Soviet lands, that those who make war and nay more those who propagate war are criminals committing crimes against humanity!
Does this law deny the inevitability of war under imperialism? No it does not. It simply notes that propagating war and making war is a crime against humanity!
This law of the Soviet land was (and is) one of the strongest weapon in the hands of communists, in the hands of workers, in the hands of humanity to fight back the warmongers and to fight for peace!
Can people become war makers and war mongers while claiming to be revolutionaries?
Of course they can.
Can revolutionaries avoid a war with reactionaries?
Of course they can, if the reactionaries become afraid of the consequences for themselves of propagating for war and war making!
It is thus that war making and propagating for war is a crime against humanity. And no amount of “the defence of human rights” and “the defence of democracy” and “avoiding civilian casualties” by the war makers can hide this fact!
Criminals who propagate war, criminals who make war should be tried and punished in accordance with this law.
What is the significance of the Soviet Peace Defence Law?
THE Second World Peace Congress, held in Warsaw in November 1950, appealed to the United Nations and Governments of all countries to prohibit all war propaganda as criminal, whatever form it might take.
The Soviet people, educated in the spirit of high respect for other peoples and peace and friendship among the nations, ardently supported this appeal. The chairman of the Soviet Peace Committee, the poet N. S. Tikhonov, reported on this historic document to the regular session of the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet, in Moscow in March 1951.
Expressing the will of all the peoples of the Soviet Union, who are striving for peace, the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet unanimously supported the appeal of the World Peace Congress, and passed unanimously the Peace Defence Law, which reads as follows:
“The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, guided by the lofty principles of the Soviet policy of peace, which aims at consolidating peace and friendly relations among nations,
“Recognises that the conscience and the sense of justice of the peoples, who in the lifetime of a single generation have gone through the calamities of two world wars, cannot tolerate the impunity with which war propaganda is being conducted by aggressive circles of certain States, and associates itself with the appeal of the Second World Peace Congress which expressed the will of the whole of progressive mankind to prohibit and condemn criminal war propaganda.
“The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics resolves:
“1. That war propaganda, in whatever form conducted, undermines the cause of peace, creates the danger of a new war and is, therefore, a grave crime against humanity.
“2. That persons guilty of war propaganda shall be committed for trial as major criminals.”
The adoption of the Peace Defence Law by the supreme organ of State power in the U.S.S.R. is fresh proof that the peoples of the Soviet Union want peace and are willing to fight for it with all their strength and in every way possible.
1.2: 1952: “A new situation faces us” in the fight for peace
“The People’s Democracies, with the fraternal aid of the Soviet Union, have continued their work of transforming their countries from some of the most backward in Europe into highly industrialised advanced States, which will soon reach and surpass the level of the West European countries.
When to these developments are added the achievements of the German Democratic Republic, the fight of the German people against rearmament, the strength of the movement for peace and against American domination in France and Italy, expressed especially in the elections of 1951, and the powerful growth in the liberation movements in the colonies, the Middle East, the Near East and North Africa, it is abundantly clear that the forces of peace are far stronger than the forces of war.
The 500 million signatories obtained to the Stockholm Appeal, and the 596 million obtained so far to the Appeal for a Five-Power Pact of Peace, are an expression of humanity’s determination to impose peace on the warmongers unparalleled in the previous history of mankind.”(H. Pollitt. Twenty-Second Congress of the Communist Party)
Communists have always condemned the war amongst nations. Communists have always been the defenders of peace. Their means of fighting for peace, their ability to preserve peace and stop war has changed continuously!
Before the First World War, they had their parties and the influence of their parties in the trade unions and other organisations of the people! They mobilised these to stop the coming First World War. Another weapon they had in hand was to threaten the imperialist bourgeois with a dire consequence of the results of their war: if you make war we shall turn this into a civil war against you in each county!
This was not much effective in stopping the war, and as we know due to the traitorous actions of the social democratic, right wing leaders, our parties refused to turn the war into a civil war, only the Bolsheviks stood behind the threat issued jointly before the war, and indeed turned the war of the Tsar upon other nations into a civil war of the proletariat and the peasants against the Tsar!
Before the Second World War, means at our disposal was much more than before. Not only did we have our parties ready to stand behind their words of turning an imperialist war into a civil war, we also had the Soviet State that was able to use diplomacy and ready and able to help stop the war mongers militarily.
During the Second World War, all our parties led the war against the Nazis and Fascists in Europe and the Japanese fascists in Asia and Pacific! And it was our motherland, the Soviets that destroyed the barbarians. At the end of the war Soviets were the most respected nation on earth, communists had the respect of all nations and were known as the fighters for national independence and for democracy!
When the USA was trying to organise a group of warmonger states and forces around it, it was finding the going very difficult. Soviets Union had formed a camp of peace, democracy and national independence around it. USSR and People's Democracies of East Europe were joined by 1949 by the People’s Democracies of Asia and most importantly the People’s Republic of China!
We also had our parties in bourgeois states as the biggest parties in France and Italy, and all the countries of the capitalist world had well respected and powerful communist parties. These, jointly with the communist parties in power were a powerful force for peace: a peace movement never seen in the history of mankind was created by the forces lined up around USSR! This also included the communist parties and national liberation forces of all the colonies and dependent countries!
The communists became powerful and thus the forces of peace have grown incredibly strong!
We could then stop the war mongers and it is thus that we were also able to pass our law in the USSR against making of war and against propagating of war, for we could apply it in practice!
After the second world war it was no longer the threat of “if you make war we will turn the war into civil war”, now we could issue a straight forward warning to the warmongers: you make war, we will defeat you and catch you and punish you for your crimes against humanity!
1.3: Peaceful co-existence
“We take our stand on the principle of the possibility of the peaceful co-existence of the capitalist and socialist systems.
The leaders of the Soviet Union have always based their policy on the possibility and necessity of peaceful co-operation between the capitalist and socialist nations. Their view was expressed by Stalin in his letter to Henry Wallace in May 1948:
“The Government of the U.S.S.R. believes that, despite the differences in economic systems and ideologies, the co-existence of these systems and the peaceful settlement of differences between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. are not only possible but absolutely necessary in the interests of universal peace.” “(H. Pollitt. Twenty-Second Congress of the Communist Party -1952)
Critics claim that the program denies the inevitability of war between capitalist and socialist states.
This is not correct.
Program does not do this.
Critics claim that the policy of peaceful co-existence is a policy that is formulated in line with the policy that denies the inevitability of war under imperialism.
This is not correct.
Program does not do this.
Is it not obvious, and should it not be obvious to any communist that the only force that can formulate the policy of peaceful co-existence while imperial capitalism exists would be communism, the socialist states, the Soviet State, the states of the people’s democracy.
It should be obvious to all the communists.
Finantial oligarchs, the bourgeois states are not interested in peace. Their history is the history of war making. Their history is the history of breaking their undertakings to peace. Peace is to these real vampires, what the wooden dagger to the heart is to fictional vampires!
Policy of peaceful co-existence is the policy of Lenin and Stalin. It is the policy of communism, of socialist states.
Communist policy regarding peace is not only the policy of peace between the bourgeois states and proletarian states, imperial-capitalist states and socialist states, it is not just the policy of peaceful co-existence.
Peace policy of communists is also the policy of peace amongst the bourgeois states, amongst the imperial-capitalist states.
Do these mean that we should close our eyes to the reality of imperialism? To the reality of capitalism? To the reality of the existence of those who propagate war and those who make war?
Of course not!
Program does not do so!
“It is the working people whose united fight, will alone ensure that this possibility (of peace and of peaceful co-existence m.n) is made a reality.” (H. Pollitt. Twenty-Second Congress of the Communist Party -1952)