Soviets hasten to fix rift

Press, 20 July 1977, Page 8

Soviets hasten to fix rift

NZPA-Reuter Moscow The Soviet Union is trying to avoid an open feud with “Eurocommunist” parties while making clear that it still regards itself as the guardian of the purity of the world Communist movement. The Kremlin attempted to soothe angered feelings after a two week row with the Spanish, Italian, and French parties. The controversy stemmed from a bitter attack in a Soviet journal of the Spanish party leader, Mr Santiago Carrillo, the most outspoken of Moscow’s West European Communist critics.

The 4000-word article in the foreign affairs weekly. "New Times,” cleany written with high authority, denounced Mr Carrillo for "esca’afng anti-Sovietism” arid accused him of trying to split the Communist movement.

It was widely interpreted as a general attack on the liberal doctrines of the three big Western parties. But in a follow-up article the anonymous writers denied that their quarrel had been with anyone but Mr Carrillo personally. It said that the attack had contained no strictures on the independence of Western parties and added: “It is quite natural that the Communist parties strive to take into account national and historial conditions in the development of their countries.” The “New Times” assault on Mr Carrillo — in the form of a review of his book ‘‘Eurocommunism and

the State” — came after a year in which the schism had widened between the main Communist parties of East and West. "Eurocommunism” — a term dismissed by “New Times” as an invention of bourgeois ideologists — came to the fore at a 29party conference organised by the Soviet Union in East Berlin last year. After a fierce wrangle with the Soviet party and its loyalist allies, the French leader, Mr Georges Marais, Mr Carrillo, and Mr Enrico Berlinguer of the Italian party, won grudging consent to chart their own policies. The three parties, recently joined by the small British Communist Party, rejected the orthodox Marxist concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat and declared their commitment to the ballot box as a means of gaining office. As the schism deepened, with the Western parties joining critics of the Soviet human rights record, the Kremlin returned to the offensive, insisting on “internationalism” -- jargon in Communist dogma for Moscow’s pre-eminence — and frequently quoting earlier pro-Soviet declarations by the Western leaders. In his book, Mr Carrillo flails Russian-style Communism for betraying true Marx-ism-Leninism. “The Soviet State has gone beyond the provisions of Lenin.

“It not only has kept bourgeois elements but has deformed and degenerated to a degree that in other times #-■

was only associated with imperialism” he wrote. Mr Carrillo’s intense criticism enraged the Kremlin, which reacted in the "New Times” article published shortly after the Spanish elections in June.

This described the Spanish Communist leader’s statements variously as "monstrous,” “staggering,” “slanderous,” “anti-Soviet,” "astounding,” and “imperialist.”

The attack on Mr Carrillo brought condemnation from the French and Italian parties and their supporters and even some implied criticism from the Rumanian party.

An Italian Communist delegation visiting Moscow told ideologists that they refused to accept that the Kremlin had a right to denounce anyone in the terms of the "New Times” attack on Mr Carrillo. Sources close to the delegation said they felt the Kremlin leaders had miscalculated the likely reaction among other parties to the “New Times” attack and were anxious to dampen the consequences. Apparent confirmation of this came in a phrase in the Soviet-drafted communique covering the talks which referred to an “independent search” by individual parties for their own policies. But as if cautioning against too much independence, the edition of “Pravda,” the Soviet Communist Party daily, which carried the cotnmunique published comments from the Czechoslovak partynewspaper, “Rude Pravo,” marking the anniversary of the Berlin conference. There was a sharp divi-

sion, “Rude Pravo” warned, “between creative search . » and Right-wing opportunism and submissions to pressure from the class enemy.” Signs of Kremlin moderation came when the Soviet news agency, Tass, published a full advance text of the second “New Times” article.

The Soviet party “does not excommunicate anyone from the communist movement and cannot set itself such an aim,” it said. However, an article in “Pravda” the same day as the “New Times” follow-up illustrated the ambiguity in the Soviet public attitude to the independence of foreign parties. Written by a West German Communist leader, Mr Herbert Mies, the “Pravda” article hailed the importance of internationalism. “For the German Communist Party the sixtieth anniversary of the October (Russian) Revolution is a worthy opportunity to confirm our unshakeable position towards proletarian internationalism,” he wrote. “In doing this we underline that as before the relation to the Soviet Union is the decisive criterion of internationalism for every communist.” Though the Kremlin seems likely to continue its public toleration of Eurocommunism, it is not likely to relinquish its views expressed in the first attack on Mr Carrillo: ■ “There is only one communism — if we speak of true, scientific communism — namely that whose principles are adhered to by the pre s e n t-day communist movement.” ’