Signs of Opposition to Deng's Invasion

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'I don'tknow what got into me... I went to America... I ate hamburgers and Coca-Cola... I wore a 10-gallon hat, and then l inyaded Vietnam.

been able to turn it against hints of an unsettling of Asian Development Bank if Mao and the remnants of his Deng's apparently unassail- the Taiwan problem Posters have appeared in unchallenged.

-French job struggles go on When we call for Chinese troops out of Press has nothing in common with the so-called peace' bleatings of imperialism.

We. know that the interests of the working class can only be threatened by the actions of the weak and terrified Chinese and Vietnamese bureaucracies.

Though US treasury secretary Michael Blumenthai may issue "strongly worded" condemnation of the Chinese invasion, it has not stopped endorsement of the Chinese regime in the form of the exchange of ambassadors on March 1. • The ferocity of the Chinese attack well into Vietnam, using 250,000 troops with 100,000 inside Vietnamese territory, the taking of the provincial capital of Lai Chau, the battle around Lang Xon and the threatening of the strategic route 1A to Hanoi has astounded many observers.

Stalinist theory

However these battles inevitably arise between bureaucracies which base rathese than interational themselves Latel. requirements. * Both regimes adhere to the worn-out theory that it is possible to build socialism in : one country.

For them, national interests predominate. Several consequences flow from this.

First is the need to secure borders against outsiders; secondly attempts are made to ensure that "buffer" states are acquired to defend the nation; and thirdly, any type of political, economic OI military alliances are justited as long as they are construed as necessary to defend the state.

Deng Of course a major consequence of the theory is that the economic problems of both China and Vietnam cannot be dealt with within the confines of the nation state, let alone the building of socialism.

It is the drive to deal with this contradiction and, particularly in China, the efforts of the bureaucracy to divert attention away from the developing discontent and turmoil in China itself that has led them to move towards war.

Mouthpiece

The only country in South East Asia prepared to be the occasional mouthpiece of China has been Kampuchea.

The Soviet Union has however been much more successful in consolidating its relationship with As a result, particularly since the signing of the Soviet-Vietnam treaty last November, China has felt itself encircled.

Vietnam itself has extended its control over Laos in which it had until recently 40,000 troops.

But. the Vietnamese invasion of Kampuchea was felt to be something that could not go unanswered by Peking's Deng clique.

The. Vietnamese leadership •itself faces enormous internal problems and has even turned to the US to beg for assistance.

Bureaucracies always live in fear of the working class, terrified lest it should flex its muscles and cast them aside.

Quaking

In Peking today the Party elite are quaking in their boots. As a reporter from the New York Times wrote:

"Before, no foreigner had met a Chinese dissident. Now practically everyone students have begun calise newsmen up at all hours of the night with tips on the latest poster."

The opposition to the bureaucratic stranglehold has become more organised with the setting up of such groups as the Human Rights Alliance and the Enlightenment Society.

This latter has recently been selling a pamphlet which included an appeal to President Carter to make a statement on behalf of human rights in China.

19 points The Human Rights Alliance, with seven authors who have not been afraid to sign their names, has put out a programme of 19 points.

Some of these are: for the release of all political prisoners; for the right to elect all state and party leaders; for the right of opposition parties to have a voicé and to be elected to the National People's Congress; for a study of Western democracy and culture as well as science and technology; and for a reconciliation / with the Soviet Union.

Rally held It is reported that on 29 January several hundred people held a rally at Peking's Democracy Wall in defence of the leaders of six different civil liberties groups that have declared their intention to fight for free speech.

The bureaucracy has so far not felt strong enough to move against the protesters.

The dominant group around Deng Xiaoping have even tolerated the movement in as far as they have Since last week's mass stru iggles against 22,000 st eel redundancies in North East the working class has continued to show its determination to fight.

Equally, the reformist CFDT and Stalinist CGT union bureaucracies have made every effort to divert the movement into harmless protest channels. • While neither the CFDT nor CGT leaders have dared to condemn openly the violent upsurge of demonstrations and occupations centred on the town of Longwy, they. have done everything possible to curb repetitions.

A mealy-mouthed CFDT statement declared eNG followers.

Now, however, there are "solidarity" with the struggle "even if its expression does not always take the forms one would wish"

The CGT evaded the issues by saying "it is not a choice between vandalism and resignation" but of "firm and bold action"

Wretched plan

Thus, as the French proletariat moves into struggle, the bureaucrats talk of "vandalism".

By "firm and bold action" the reformists and Stalinists mean their wretched plan for "restructuring the steel industry" while leaving the capitalist system that has created the crisis, untouched.

The CFDT has talked about the need to "avoid a social explosion". , the only 11le Pes: 19e lails • able position. mobilisation proposed is a protest march to Paris at the end of March!

And even here the CFDT leaders have attacked the idea of "mixing together all sections and regions in an indifferent manner"-they demand restriction of the action to Lorraine steelworkers.

Such moves came in a week when miners from Houilleres de Cevennes closed the main A7 motorway in a demonstration against pit closures and steel workers in the Bouches-duRhone region struck to win wage demands.

The employers, of course, are far bolder than the workers' "leaders"

The metal and mining bosses federation (UIMM) called off the first meeting in the proposed series of Hua the last few days attacking the invasion of Vietnam-a move clearly seen as Deng's brainchild.

It is also hinted that there is opposition to Deng's modernisation programme.

A sudden summons from Peking ten days ago caused the return homé of the Chinese delegates conducting negotiations with the Japanese national oil corporation on joint exploration in the Gulf of Pohai.

"delayed" to the Nippon Steel Corporation who had a £l billion contract and companies which were to supply chemical processing plant.

Deng may have launched the invasion of Vietnam to build up nationalist sentiments and engender the idea of unity in the face of an outside threat, but he does not appear to have succeeded.

No doubt his recent remarks that China intends to join the IMF and • the . solved will similarly not go Bureaucratic perks in Peking-scarc negotiations on the grounds that the union had failed to adequately deal with the violence of their members.

There has been talk of forces serving "interests foreign to those of the nation" and the beginning of the use of the courts.

Enormous questions are now posed before French workers.

Even as the leaders pleaded for negotiations and made militant noises, steel workers seized railway stations once again in the Moselle region-exposing the superficial nature of the supposed "restoration of order" at Longwy.

More than ever grows the need for a revolutionary party in France-section of a reconstructed Fourthl

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HALIST PKESS, wear weanesday i March, 19rs

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Vietnam and Vietnam- ese troops out . of Kampuchea, Socialist

"Delayed" Also Chinese' import licences s have now been