ECONOMICS WHY THE USSR WANTS EAST-WEST TRADE —AND WARY IT IS NOT A PANACEA

EXPANDING east-west trade has become an increasingly insistent theme in Soviet policy and propaganda. world have provided a reader hearing than for a de- Spreading symptoms of depression in the capitalist cade for such proposals, and have forced some relaxa_ tion of trade restrictions imposed during the cold war.

The USA, however, lags very much behind the European capitalist countries in developing exchanges with the USSR —but it is precisely with the USA that the Soviet rulers would most like to expand trade.

Emphasis has-been laid in Soviet speeches and articles upon the development of trade as a means to ward off capitalist depression—~the. appeal being directed not to the Labour movement but to. business and government circles.

There are plenty of other indications, too, that whatever merits east-west trade may have it is primarily viewed by the Soviet Government as a means of overcoming their economic difficulties and enabling development to proceed more smoothly.

‘Would enliven business activity’

Last June Khrushchev addressed a letter to Eisenhower on the. subject, offering a big programme of exchanges which ‘would enable American industries to work at a higher percentage of their capacity and would raise the level of employment’.

An article by the president of the Soviet Chamber of Commerce states that his country is willing to place orders worth wants to buy in the USA will admittedly enable a short cut to be taken in the building up of sectors of the economy (chemicals, refrigeration, plastics etc.) in which she is deficient.

And what is offered in return? Mainly raw materials and the typical products of a less advanced country. If possible, too, the USSR wants credits from the capitalist west.

Cannot make real inroads It is probably truc that the USSR wants more from the advanced countries than she can directly pay for.

In the mean time sales of Soviet goods on the world market have in some cases cantributed to falling prices and intensified trade problems.

In so far as goods fram the Soviet Union are received in exchange for those sent from the advanced capitalist countries, they still haye to be realized on the market.

It is difficult to see how east-west trade—of the kind which the Soviet leaders propose—can make real inroads on the capitalist trading problems.

That is not an argument against it. All trade. restrictians and bans should be apposed, those on trade with the - USSR and China in particular.

Should be no iHlusions - But there should be. no ilhusions in east-west trade as a panacea for our ills, such as seem to be held by some trade union and Labour leaders as .part of the alternative to a struggle against capitalism. - -Qn the contrary, it must be seen as a weapon in the fight:

First, against capitalist restrictions and insecurity; Secondly, against the claims of the Soviet leadership to have built ‘socialism in one country’; Thirdly, for a real international socialist programme.

meh Og.