Coalition govt. for W. Germany

Stalinists force The weekend Central Committee meeting ended with the announcement that Dubcek had been removed from the Party's leading body, the Presidium, and that 29 of his supporters had been expelled from the 180-strong Party Central Committee.

Together with the Party purge, there has been a similar drive against Dubcek 'liberals' in the government, which, after tendering its resignation on Saturday, reformed with posts. limited period, while it rallied able to hold the 'hard-line' Stalinists on ing class. whom it depended to crush the revolutionary awakening in the workers and youth.

The return of the Novotny 'old guard' poses tremendous dangers for the Soviet bureaucracy however.

All those compromised bj under of government ofice the regime which framed and executed scores of leading Party members are he last people to choose a: he basis of a popular nev regime.

The formation of such a government would undoubtedly trigger off far bigger struggles than anything yet seen in Czechoslovakia.

But the Kremlin has no choice.

The liberals have been used up. They are either too discredited, or too weak to be big Czech purge back Harassed The Soviet bureaucracy, harassed daily by internal opposition to its own rule, now has to lean directly on the same bureaucrats who served Stalin in his purges of the early 1950s.

Already the Czech radio speaks of Dubcek's group as 'those people who led our Party and society into the mud.

This is indeed familiar language, the language of the Slansky trial, of the Moscow trials of the old Bolsheviks.

The Stalinist purge indicates the complete inability of the stability bureaucracy to achieve any just as much as it exposes once and for all the bankruptcy of Dubcek, who never once turned to the working THE final returns for Sunday's West German General Election are: Christian Democrats 242 seats (a loss of three), Social Democrats 224 (a gain of 22) and Free Democrats 30 (a loss of 19).

The swing towards the Social Democrats makes possible a coalition between Brandt and the Free Democrats, who between them command a 12-seats majority.

Joint talks began early Monday morning about forming the first post-war government dominated by the Social Whatever its final composition the elections have solved nothing for the German capitalist class.

class as the only force can defeat Stalinism.

For those British Stalinists gradual who pinned their hopes on a pressure, the results of the Central Committee meeting must have been a bitter blow, with its grovelling statement that the Kremlin invasion of last year was 'under no circumstances • • an act oI aggression against the people •.. It was not a matter of occupation of Czechoslovak territory and of suppression of freedom ...

What all Stalinist bureaucrats fear above everything else is this huge strike wave boiling up in Western Europe, which now has rolled right up to the frontiers of Czechoslovakia itself.

What is directly posed is the unity of the entire European working class behind a single programme and leadership.

This can only mean the building of the Fourth International.

Political Correspondent Brandt or Kiesinger will face a vastly more . powerful and confident working class which acts not only through votes, but in a growing wages movement.

Pre-election attempts to contain this upsurge were defeated.

Thousands of young workers and trade unionists drove the ultra-right National Democratic Party (NPD) oil the streets in city after city.

Treachery

The Social Democrats' failure to win an absolute majority is not at all a defeat for the working class.

They can expect only treachery and betrayal from the Brandt leadership, which has removed even the worc socialism from its election propaganda.

The NPD failed to reach the 5 per cent share required to win Bundestag representation, but it should not be dismissed.

Von Thadden will only win mass support from the middle class and the monopolies if, once more, the Social Democrats and the trade union leaders succeed in betraying the workers' decisive struggles.

German Trotskyists must ensure that this does not happen.

Forces

The re-awakened German workers' wages struggles will be directed not only against the employers, but against the union and SPD bureaucracy.

The forces for the revolutionary party will be found and trained in the trade unions and amongst the youth.

The hatred shown by young workers for the NPD proves that the German working class has at last recovered from all the horrors of the Third Reich.

WORKE Septembe