No Peace Without Socialism: Aldermaston March must be Anti-Tory

The third Aldermaston march takes place under the shadow of increasing capitalist war preparations.

Eisenhower has announced a record breaking American defence expenditure of 40.6 billion dollars. France has tested her second atomic bomb. Adenauer's regime, staffed by 'ex-Nazis' is now negotiating for bases in Franco Spain. Alfred Krupp, like his father before him, assures us that his giant £600 million combine is producing for peace. No doubt, however, the junior Krupp will be only too pleased to make his 'patriotic' and profitable contribution to the needs of NATO.

British arms expenditure for the financial year beginning this month, will reach the staggering figure of £1,630 million. For the rocket and missile manufacturers such as de Havilland and English Electric, war promises to be an extremely lucrative practice. Even now no firm prices for missiles have yet been fixed. In November, 1958, the prices estimated by the Ministry of Supply were more than double those given to the War Office in 1956.

English Electric, who entered an original estimate for Thunderbird of £2,500,000 in 1950, now blithely state that it will cost £27 million. No wonder the shareholders consider Britain should pursue a firm nuclear policy.

Statesmen unmoved

Despite all the glib utterances and pious statements made by Macmillan, Eisenhower and de Gaulle about their peaceful intentions, the facts remain uncontestable. Along with their NATO and SEATO allies, the big imperialist powers remain completely impervious to world-wide feelings for peace.

The limitations of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament are now becoming obvious to many of its members. What next after the marches, the meetings, the leaflets and the lobbies? CND members are beginning to ask.

Conscious of the Campaign's limitations, a wide section of the leaders are becoming frustrated and casting a hopeful eye in the direction of the summit. Since its inception, CND has concentrated its time and activities on trying to convince the capitalist statesmen of the need to renounce their nuclear weapons. The statesmen have completely failed to respond to this activity. At the summit will be present exactly the very same statesmen, representing the capitalist interests that put them into power.

For CND to place its hopes and expectations in the summit conference will be to continue the policies that have led to the present impasse.

The real problem for CND still remains: how to bring the working class into action against these statesmen and their war plans.

This implies for CND a turn towards the organized Labour movement. This year, there will be more trade unions and Labour Parties on the Aldermaston march than on the two previous occasions, which is an indication of the anti-war feelings developing amongst the working class.

The test of the union leaders who lead their contingents on the trek from Aldemaston to London will not be the strength of their arches, however, or even the number of anti-Bomb speeches that they make, but will be decided by the resolute way that they lead the fight for socialist policies in the unions and the Labour Party.

In Britain today, thousands of railway workers live on wages that are barely above subsistence level. Many more are faced with redundancy. Miners are being sacked as the result of pit closures. The housing programme is totally inadequate to meet people's needs. Rents for both council and private tenants are constantly raised.

It is necessary for the Campaign to join with those in the Labour Party who are fighting for an extension of the house building programme, against rent increases, for more schools and modern hospitals, for higher wages and better conditions if it is to win the working class to the struggle against the Tory government's nuclear policies. Socialists in the Labour Party constantly attempt to show how money diverted to arms expenditure not only swells the profits of big business and prepares for war, but is done at the cost of lowering working class living standards.

To prevent nuclear annihilation the CND and its supporters must give their support to the struggle for socialist policies. This means placing the Campaign in the main stream of working class struggle against the Tory government and not depending on the summit politicians who can bring neither peace internationally nor social progress at home.