'STAR' NOT SAY
By John Spencer
1972John SpencerCommunist Party and Stalinism Read the scan at ETOL (PDF) →Read from the scan by machine and not corrected: headlines and words can be misread, and a caption or advert can run into the text. For anything you quote, read the scan.
the 1930s, as they had hailed the Stalin-Hitler Pact under which communist refugees from fascism were handed over to the SS, as they hailed the invasion of Hungary in 1956 —are still there, many of them still in the leadership of the British Communist Party, Gollan, Ramelson, Palme Dutt, Wainwright, Rothstein, Kerrigan.
When did they discover that the murder of communists was 'regrettable'? None of these men can speak out today.
But that does not mean that there are not people still in the British Communist Party who hanker for the good old days when trials were mere formalities and criticism meant a bullet in the back of the neck.
The 'Morning Star' of January 26 carried a letter from one George Smith referring to Sling and his comrades as 'anti-state and anti-socialist elements'.
No nonsense about trials from Mr Smith. Of course they're guilty, they were arrested weren't they? What more proof of guilt could you want?
And in the 'Morning Star' of January 31, I. W. Baker is equally outspoken:
'This issue should not have been raised in the "Morning Star", he says. 'We are helping the enemy' The classic answer given to anybody who criticized Moscov E. A. Edwards of Oxford also knows the verdict in advance:
'How much longer are we to tolerate in the "Morning Star" sympathies for and virtual support of those elements in Czechoslovakia who continue to carry out anti-socialist working-class activities, and antiBut there are some people in the British Communist Party who are little squeamish about judicial murder. Someone-someone nice and safe has to be trotted out as a safety valve for them.
Who better than Monty Johnstone, the permanent protest man 'expert