PURGE OF FORDS' MILITANTS BEGINS

Nehru THE American government has lost little time in deciding to send arms to India. Together with his British, Canadian and French allies, Kennedy is only too pleased to help Nehru in the border war against China. hrushchev, on the other hand, has made no statement on the question. While Izvestia and Pravda welcomed some Chinese proposals for ending the fighting, the Russians have remained neutral between capitalist India and the Chinese workers' state. le statement issued last Wednesday by the British CP is also an evasion of the real issue. It refuses to take sides in the conflict which, it alleges, has been fostered by the Americans. eanwhile Nehru and Menon stir up an atmosphere of patriotic hysteria. They have called especially for an end to all strike action. The state of emergency declared on October 26 gives them the right to arrest any opponents without trial. le Communist Party of India has declared its support for 'all necessary measures of defence'. It will pay a heavy price for this betrayal of internationalism, for it will itself be a victim of the wave of jingoism. ne border dispute has been presented by the world press as an act of Chinese agression. It concerns mountainous territory in the Ladakh area on the North-west and in the North-east Frontier Agency. nis territory has been traditionally regarded as Chinese. In 1914, the British delegate to the Simla Conference, McMahon, agreed a frontier with a local Tibetan delegate. At no time was it agreed by the Chinese government. le Indians now claim that this 'McMahon' line is the legal boundary, and also allege it to be further north than the Chinese say. Nehru, on October 12, called for the Chinese to be 'thrown out' of this area.

THE defence of the Cuban revolution against US imperialism is now the acid test for the world Trotskyist movement.

For us in Britain, this defence can only be accomplished by the most resolute struggle against the Tory government, the class allies of Kennedy's administration.

This fight against our own ruling class must, of course, be part of international action carried out by the Trotskyists of all countries. We are fighting to establish the independence of the working class from capitalist war diplomacy.

SEPARATES

It is this class approach which separates us sharply from the pacifists and the Stalinists. They look to the United Nations, which is an agency of imperialism, and talk about the establishment of peace by summit discussions between the great powers.

The liberals, pacifists and even Stalinists who only yesterday were condemning the Soviet H-tests are now hailing Khrushchey as a great man of peace, because he has agreed to dismantle the rocket bases in Cuba.

DEFEAT

They are not really concerned about the Cuban revolution and they would be perfectly agreeable to seeing the revolution defeated rather than fight• the real class enemy.

These quitters from the class struggle always show up sharpest in times of war danger. They have no faith in the working class to defend the conquests of the revolution either in Cuba or in the Soviet Union.

They look for a way out through compromise between the classes and generally wind up with the bloodiest of wars on their hands. So it was in the past, so it will be in the future.

The Stalinist bureaucracy of Khrushchev rests on the nationalised property relations in the Soviet Union established by the October Revolution.

The need of this bureaucracy is to defend its own selfish and parasitic interests, but in doing so it has to defend the property relations from which it gets its privileges.

OPPOSED

The Soviet bureaucracy genuinely seeks peaceful coexistence with the imperialists. They are opposed to the extension of the revolution in any part of the world under conditions which will upset the equilibrium of their struggle for class compromise with the capitalist class.

The conditions created by such a struggle would lead eventually to the overthrow of the bureaucracy itself.

The Stalinists defend the Soviet Union in order to protect the interests of the bureaucracy; the Trotskyists defend the Soviet Union against the interests of the bureaucracy.

We fight to extend the revolution in the countries dominated by world imperialism, and in doing this we strike a blow against inperialism and the interests of the Soviet and social democratic bureaucracies simultaneously RELIES The power politic diplomacy of the Soviet bureaucracy is designed to defend its interests and needs. To do this it relies on the United Nations.

Thus the Soviet Union joined hands with American imperialism in calling the United Nations into the Congo. UNO helped murder Lumumba and destroy the movement for genuine independence.

In the case of Cuba, Khrushev has provided Castro and s people with food supplies, stewards who were involved in the strike of the paint, trim and assembly workers had been taken back.

In a television interview on Monday, Mr. Lesley Blakenan, the Labour Relations Manager, emphatically stated hat the labour force is to be educed by "several hundred" ind that the Company has 10 intention of re-engaging roublemakers'.

This is the showdown that las been threatened for many nonths. In the course of the ast two weeks Fords have hit jut with a ruthlessness which urpasses even the actions of Rootes at British Light Steel Pressings last year.

They have not attempied to hide he course of victimisation upon hich they are set.

Ihis will be the pattern which nore and more engineering em›loyers will take in the coming nonths.

The trade union leaders who lave been closeted with the Ford nanagement in negotiations over he past few months must be held esponsible for this state of affairs. For them to complain and weep rocodile tears over the good conluct letters is the height of hyporisy.

Their vacillations and manoeuTes and their condemnation of he stewards and unofficial strikes n the past 12 months have been . direct encouragement to Fords • go ahead with their present policy The Amalgamated Engineering Jnion has called on Fords to renstate Bill Francis, the shop teward who's sacking sparked off re strike two weeks ago. What hey intend to do when this is urned down they don't make lear.

The stand of the shop stewards committee in demanding official strike action to prevent any victimisation is much more forthright and correct.

Fords must be faced squarely • the trade union movement. Sir trick Hennessy once again this back page, col. 3