Reply political slander

Vietnamese in their struggle against aggression.

Banda as a speaker...

Messali Hadj....

this was at variance with our raison d'etre.

supporting the victim of the aggression.

and by the 'Young Socialists.. gainst imperialism: Unite together. in egard ter other workers or whatever other workers' or whatever other government might arise before the war or during the war. The defeat of every imperialist government in the struggle with government in the struggle with the workers' state or with a on behalf of the Vietnamese people goes right back to the Saigon and Hanoi uprisings and the proclamation of the Democratic Republic in 1946.

When the French imperialism, with the connivance of its Stalinist Ministers, tried to retain the Vietnamese Republic within the French Union, the French Trotskyists were the only political group to oppose this reactionary move. MICHAEL BANDA claration of Intention', which prescribed national elections for the reunification of Vietnam, to be held not later than July 1956. The worthlessness of this concession can be seen in a remark made by the Communist North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam)

Prime Minister, Pham Van Dong, to one of my Vietnamese friends immediately after the signing of the agreements.

When asked which side he thought_ would win the elections, Dong replied: "You know as well as I do that there won't be any election".'* Today no one, except the Moscow Stalinists and their British counterparts, is enthusiastic about the Geneva Agreement and a return to another cynical summit conference.

Is this why Schoenman is so amazed by our stand on Geneva?

No, Mr. Schoenman, the Trotskyists cannot and will not support the fraudulent secret diplomacy of the imperialist gangsters and their Kremlin stooges.

If we did not make a big issue of this at the meeting it is because firstly we undertook not to do so but also because history has effectively exposed the 'sanctity' of this agreement. There will be NO return to Geneva.

Now let us return to the question of 'factional considerations'. The references to the article in The Newsletter (December 12, 1964) written by P. Desai are hardly illuminating.

This was a signed article expressing the viewpoint of the author-and not that of the Socialist Labour League. After a reply from a leading member of the League, Desai acknowledged his error. So it is just dishonest, or shall we say, factional for Mr. Schoenman to misrepresent this episode.

SLL and MNA As for Messali Had), it is obvious to us that Mr. Schoenman knows nothing of the history of the Socialist Labour League's record on Algeria.

The League and The Newsletter supported with reservations the Algerian National Movement (MNA) so long as it adhered to its founding programme. But when the MNA began to talk of negotiating with de Gaulle-a policy which was later followed by the National Liberation Front (FLN) —we broke off all relations with the movement and its leader.

As for the FLN,, we refused to repose any confidence in this bourgeois organisation and subsequent events in Algeria have amply confirmed this. Their acceptance of the Evian agreement was a complete betrayal of Algerian independence-or do Mr. Schoenman and his Pabloite advisers-Jordan and Taite—disagree?

It is unfortunate-terribly unfortunate-for Schoenman that *['Communism in North Viet Nam', , by P. J. Honey. Ampersand Books 1965.] more than indulgent when people of a ditterent, and reactionary, persuasion are involved.

we reter, of course, to his attitude to the lascists and racialists. For the benefit of our readers, and his own lessinstructed supporters, we quote below extracts from his letter to 'The Guardian' when the Labour-controlled educational authority in Coventry quite correctly sacked Colin Jordan from his teaching job:

I am deeply concerned about the response of the left in this country to Mr. Colin Jordan and Sir Oswald Mosley. I believe that individual freedom is dependent upon a willingness to tolerate the ideas of those whom we despise. It is no test of a belief in free speech to tolerate those views with which we agree. The test lies in the willingness to permit those we cannot bear. Colin Jordan is a teacher of competence and I believe it is outrageous to deny him the right to teach because of his political views....

•.. • The Nazis in this country serve to provide the left with a means of expiating its sense of impotence. This is not only because civil liberties are involved, but politically destructive because it is so revealing. . . '! (Our emphasis.)

(Guardian, August 9, 1962.)

Yet Schoenman has the temerity to support a war crimes commission based. on the example of the Nuremberg Commission! What an utter fraud! Will allenate the middle class.

A united tront is not a straitjacket, but a means whereby aitterent parties with dittering programmes combine to strike together on a particular issue which transcends any doctrinal ditterences they might have.

In the case of the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign, the overriding issue was, and is, the defeat of US imperialism and the unconditional victory of the National Liberation Front.

Justified attack All those who oppose this victory, like Wilson and the Stalinists, are obviously opposed likewise to the Campaign. And since neither the Stalinists nor the parliamentary 'lefts' publicly supported the Campaign, the speakers were quite justified in attacking them as lustily as they could.

That is the united front as we Trotskyists conceive it.

If this is not so, then what is the purpose of a separate existence for the Solidarity Campaign? What indeed!

Would it not be better if it disbanded and merged with the Stalinist-controlled Council for Peace in Vietnam? What is Schoenman's and Russell's attitude to the Stalinists who-consciously and consistently betray the anti-imperialist struggles?

Why didn't Schoenman reveal the text of Kosygin's reply • to Russell at the meeting and why did he have to wait two weeks and release it to the press only after Russell had a long conversation with a high official of the Russian Embassy.

for and pay for of every they Every some 10,000 What longer Already, it Act TeleFoniste Irish Associaduring their strike. Under victims Fianna Fail and Fine some cases, PICKETING ILLEGAL hat will make picketing ¡legal in tese strike Licence ti ard bimposed on the the Labour Court tees trebled.

Tine TUC will empowered off' the register any union it dis registe Unions and approves of.

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