Labour and CND

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fon NWS to Overse is doctors in this. from regular Socialist Organiser contributor Bob Sutcliffe. £2.50 from bookshops, or (with 50p post and packing) from Pluto, From Pluto Press:

an analysis of canitalism in crisis The Works, 105a Be Avenue NOW IS the time to decide on just how far you, as an individual are prepared to go to preserve this planet. As socialists we do not like living in a capitalist society, but are we willing to face the fact that we will have to counter not only hostility to unilateral nuclear disarmament, but also greatly intensified hostility to socialism?

The opposition will come from the expected quarters - the Tories, the media, the City of London, the established church and the USA.

It will also come, increasingly, from Liberals and the SDR. This hostility must be expected and we must be ready to counter it with determination. We need to ensure, that our Labour carty enderlap is prepares a east de. During.

aSSO hetimes hard to tell.

Do not let a Liberal or a Social Democrat tell you, or the press, that they want unilateral nuclear disarmament - they do not see the issue as essential, they see it as a 'good idea' on a par with stopping dogs fouling the pavements. Unless a CND supporter voted Labour, that voter was not truly committed to unilateral nuclear disarmament. They were, and are, more interested in and attached to their comfortable way of life and they are afraid to face any major change. We must take on board the only alternatives to an all-out battle . for socialist unilateral nuclear disarmament, and they are bleak.

1. Give up thoughts of a socialist Britain and comfort ourselves th ance politics may ebel Thatcherismo 4250 from th issue and gain back some support from the media, which will allow a more favourable coverage of other parts of Labour' Programme. This allows the establishment at large to put the red flag back to half mast.

Both alternatives leave us as vulnerable to nuclear attack as possible, and both leave us heavily in debt to USA finance.

We must get across the idea that only by taking unilateral nuclear disarmament as part of a full socialist programme can' unilateral nuclear disarmament be achieved, and this can open the door to European Nuclear Disarmament as it closes the door to American domination in Europe. We have the deck stacked against us, we do not need to discover again that our leaders are ungure of their sense. of direction:

DAF LINCOLN to it than the Labour leftists who went for it on 'common sense' grounds. Socialist Action are left as the last defenders of the nationalist fortress, vainly hoping that their little red pennants will outshadow the huge Union Jack fluttering overhead.

FOOTNOTE: The Socialist Action feature also contains a short piece by Davy Jones attacking Socialist Organiser. We voted with the right wing in Islington South Labour Party to 'support the EEC', he says.

But the resolution was not tô 'support the EEC'; it declared that the call for withdrawal is an 'empty gesture' ', and advocated a Europe-wide socialist policy instead. The proposer, and most of those who voted for it, were left-wingers.

Anyway, 'staying with the Left' makes sense tactically end organisationally, but not es cale to decide basic p ations, Marxists shri themselves.

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Socialiss Organiser na 142, August 4,1983 Page 14:

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