Soviet treatment of Western communists: a comparative analysis

HEINZ TIMMERMANN

Soviet Treatment of Western Communists: A Comparative Analysis*

As the essays in this issue demonstrate, relations between the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the Western nonruling Communist Parties have been marked by a multiplicity of open and hidden altercations since Khrushchev's de-Stalinization Congress in 1956. After the military coup of December 13, 1981 that signified the bankruptcy of the Soviet-Communist model of society imposed on Poland, these divergences have sharpened dramatically. In their reaction to the suppression of the reform process in Poland, which they regard as Soviet-inspired, the leaderships of the Communist Parties of Italy (PCI), Spain (PCE), Japan (JCP), and a series of smaller Western Communist Parties (Sweden, Australia, Mexico) have directed pointed criticisms at the basic principles of the policy of the CPSU--criticizing both its model of society and its foreign policy. For the leaderships of these Parties, Soviet policies today both discredit the idea of Socialism itself and block its spread, especially in the highly developed industrial countries of the West. These Parties now conclude that they should emancipate themselves from Moscow still further, under the sign of a "new internationalism." The Italian and Spanish Communists, in any case, announced at the *The author is indebted to Julius Friend for the expert translation of this manuscript. "Western Communists" denotes the Communist Parties in the highly developed industrial countries of the Western world, including Japan. STUDIES IN COMPARATIVECOMMUNISM

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end of 1981 their intention to give up the special character Of their relations with the CPSU and concentrate in future on cooperation with democratic Socialists in building a politically strong and socially progressive European Community. ~ Just as Lenin after the outbreak of the First World War pronounced the Social Democratic Second International defunct, setting himself at the head of a new revolutionary movement, so did the Italian and Spanish Communists now proclaim the bankruptcy of "real Socialism," Soviet Communist style, which regards itself as the true heir for the Third International founded by Lenin. In Moscow's eyes, this "secularization" of the Communist Parties (in the sense of renunciation of the fixed Soviet doctrines of a canonized Marxism-Leninism) is most alarming. Certainly the leaders of the CPSU do not fear any genuinely revolutionary dynamics from the Western Communists. This aspect plays only a subordinate role in Soviet considerations, as the U.S.S.R. since Stalin has also increasingly "secularized" itself and lets its policies be ruled primarily by its own state interests. Further evidence for the tendency to "secularization" of Soviet policies is the fact that the national liberation movements in the Third World and the Social Democrats and Socialists in Europe play a more important role today in the political calculations of the Soviet leadership than do the Western Communists. Whereas the latter increasingly criticize Soviet concepts, Moscow expects rich dividends from the intensification of relations with the former. 2 All this does not, of course, mean that the CPSU leadership has become indifferent to continuation of relations with the Western Communists. On the contrary, they are still regarded as an important factor for bolstering Soviet foreign policy decisions and beating the drums for Moscow in their own countries. It should be added that the leadership of the CPSU needs the connection to the Communist Parties for the permanent legitimation of the Soviet system itself. The Soviet population must be given the impression that the working class movement of the whole world still looks to the Soviet Union as the most highly developed socialist society and the central protagonist of freedom and social progress in the world. Hence the Soviet Union seeks to avoid a break with the Communist Parties of the West, and has recently taken considerable pains to expand the network of Communist Parties in those regions where the Communist movement was previously only I. Cf. for the PCI "Aprire una nuova fase della Iotta per il socialismo," resolution by the Direzione of the Party later approved by the CC, rUnitd, December 30, 1981; for the PCE see the CC resolution, El Pals (Madrid), January 13, 1982. 2. Cf. my article "The CPSU and the Western Communist Parties in the 1980s," International Journal (Toronto), XXXII, 2 (Spring 1982), pp. 241-262.

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weakly represented (for example in Africa and in the Arab world). For all these reasons, the CPSU leadership sets a very high value on assembling the largest possible number of "fraternal Parties" at its congresses and at multilateral Communist conferences. The leaders of the CPSU can tolerate individual Parties giving themselves room to maneuver, to increase their political impact by being flexible enough to accommodate themselves to national and regional conditions. This tendency toward multiplicity of form must, however, not lead to deviations of content from the "general laws" of the Socialist Revolution and the construction of Socialism/Communism, which would downgrade the leading role of the Communist Party in the construction of Socialism, or cast doubt on their duty to uphold the foreign policy of the Socialist community of states. The explosive effect of this stricture lies in the Soviet pretension to a binding interpretation of these "general laws," and the claim that the Soviet constitution of 1977 is an exemplary realization of them. 3 (Here I differ from Joan Urban's views that the Soviet ideologists regard the experience of the CPSU merely as a variant of the general laws.) Obviously, two Parties discussed here--the PCI and PCE--have long since crossed Moscow's threshold of tolerance in their basic criticism of Soviet society and foreign policy. They thereby pose a serious dilemma for the Soviet leadership. The PCI is the largest and most influential CP in the West. Should one maintain relations with it in spite of its radical criticisms, hoping to convert it from its present line, like the French Communist Party (PCF) in 1979/1980? Or should one break with it, since the cost-benefit ratio of continued relations is becoming steadily more negative? I will not attempt to analyze here the relations between the CPSU and the dissident Communists in their different phases. Extensive and penetrating investigations of these questions already exist, the preceding contributions on the Italian, French, Spanish, and Japanese Communists in this issue not least among them. I will rather attempt to touch on some aspects of Soviet decisionmaking in dealing with Western Communist Parties, and describe the forms and effectiveness of some of the means employed. And finally, some speculation is in order on the prospects for Soviet behavior toward Western Communists during the 1980s.

3. Cf. the statement by Mikhail Suslov quoted in Neues Deutschland (East Berlin), November 11, 1977.

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Aspects of Soviet Decisionmaking As in many areas of Soviet policy, we know little about how the Soviet leadership evolves its intentions and makes decisions about relations with Western Communists. Here the present situation differs from the early period of Bolshevik rule, when struggles over the Party line in the Comintern Parties were closely connected with the factional struggles at Moscow headquarters. In those days factional leaders like Stalin, Trotsky, and Zinoviev attempted, inter alia, to strengthen their domestic Party positions by assuring themselves majorities in the leaderships of the Western Communist Parties. To some degree similar phenomena recurred in the Khrushchev era, as Julius Friend remarks; there were, for example, close ties between the Molotov-Kaganovich group and the leadership under Maurice Thorez. Their common interest lay in overthrowing the Soviet Party chief and stopping the de-Stalinization process which he had introduced. The Soviet leadership of the Brezhnev era, on the contrary, is distinguished by a maximum of conceptual uniformity and stability of personnel. This does not mean that there are no differences of nuance in its relations with Western Communists. One must not overlook the fact that leading functionaries like Mikhail Suslov4 and Boris Ponomarev, 5 for example, hold the Western Communists to adherence to revolutionary strategy more frequently and more decisively than do other CPSU leaders. This seems, however, to have more to do with these figures' functions than with divergences of principle, and may involve the existence of personal ties to particular people or groups in Western Parties. As the leading policymakers of the Central Committee apparat, Ponomarev and Suslov have had the task of behaving harshly toward the Western Communists, of demanding that they respect the basic principles of "Marxism-Leninism" and "proletarian internationalism." This thesis is not contradicted by the behavior of a man like Vadim Zagladin, who in the West, and indeed among Western European Commnnists themselves, is often considered the representative of a more conciliatory line inside the Soviet leadership. Certainly Zagladin is often more flexible toward the autonomy-oriented Western Communist Parties than Ponomarev. Zagladin has had long and intimate knowledge 4. Suslov, who died in January 1982, was the Central Committee secretary responsible for the international Communist movement, foreign policy, and Communist theory. He ranked second to Brezhnev in the Patty hierarchy. 5. Politburo candidate Ponomarev is the Central Committee (CC) secretary responsible for nonruling Communist Parties, for the national and social-revolutionary liberation movements, and for the Social Democratic and Socialist parties.

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of the situation in Western Europe, whereas Ponomarev, who began his career in the old Comintern apparatus, is depicted by former PCE leader Manuel Azc~ate as "an uninformed and not very intelligent man. ,,6 Zagladin is surely more open to innovative ideas than typical Party careerists like Ponomarev and Konstantin Zarodov, the former chief editor of World Marxist Review, who died in April 1982. Zagladin himself emerged from the world of Party think-tanks and institutes and maintains close ties with it. All the same, Zagladin's flexibility seems only a tactical variant in the Soviet leadership's attempts to continue, under changed circumstances, to bind the Western Communists to the Communist movement oriented toward Moscow. This thesis is supported by the fact that Zagladin has never deviated on questions of principle from the Soviet general line. Indeed he has in the past two years set his face resolutely against the "Third Way" between Social Democracy and Soviet Communism, demanding at a time when EastWest differences were sharpening that the Western Communists make an unambiguous choice for the socialist camp led by the Soviet Union. 7 Thus one must assume that a basic consensus exists in today's Soviet leadership on relations with Western Communists, including the socalled Eurocommunists of Italy, France, and Spain--and their Japanese associates. All important decisions on these questions are doubtless made by the Politburo, whether these concern the convocation of international Communist conferences or the shaping of relations with individual Parties. Leonid Brezhnev himself represented the CPSU at the Third Moscow World Conference in 1969 and the East Berlin conference of European Communists in 1976, and it was he who received Party leaders in Moscow: Santiago Carrillo in 1974, Enrico Berlinguer in 1976 and 1978, Georges Marchais in 1980, Kenji Miyamoto in 1979 (on the occasion of the normalization of CPSU-JCP relations). Bilateral meetings with leading representatives of Western Parties were often chaired by Suslov, occasionally by Andrei Kirilenko. s 6. Cf. George Urban, "Eurocommunism at Its Spanish Turning Point," interview with Manuel Azcfi'ate, Encounter, LII, 3 (March 1979), p. !I. Until his expulsion from the Central Committee in November 1981, Azc{trate was a member of the executive of the Spanish Communist Party and head of its international department. 7. Cf. the article signed Boris Vesnin [Vadim Zagladin], "No Third Choice," New Times, IX, 17 (April 1980), pp. 5-6. Zagladin's argument is pursued at greater length in his "Velikii Oktiabr' i kommunisticheskoe dvizhenie: proshloe i nastoiashchee," Vopros), istorii KPSS, XXIV, II (November 1980), pp. 13-30. 8. Politburo member Kirilenko is the CC secretary responsible for domestic policy and Party work. At the time of Suslov's death he was considered the third man in the Party hierarchy, after Brezhnev and Suslov.

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Important tactical measures against Western Communists are clearly discussed in the Politburo. This happened, for example, when the CPSU normalized its relations with the PCE in 1974. Despite vehement resistance by the Soviets, the PCE insisted that the joint communiqu6 include a sentence on the existence of divergences between the two Parties. The CPSU delegation--which was led by Susiov--was unable to give its consent until it had obtained approval from the CPSU Politburo. 9 Presumably the Politburo itself ruled that Giancarlo Pajetta, chief PCI delegate at the CPSU Twenty-sixth Congress, might not deliver a message of greeting from the Congress podium. Since the Soviets plan everything in detail for such occasions, leaving nothing to chance, this move against a top-level PCI delegation must have been designed to make an example of the disobedient Party. In general, however, unlike earlier times, problems regarding relations with Western Communists must take up only a small part of Politburo discussions devoted to foreign relations. Here foreign policy in its various dimensions has clear priority. Even the determination of relations with the Third World national liberation movements and with West European Social Democrats and Socialists appears--for reasons discussed earlier--to claim more Politburo time than developments among Western Communists. This in turn increases the scope of Ponomarev's International Department of the CPSU Central Committee Secretariat. Obviously it does not merely cooperate in the preparation and execution of Politburo decisions, or limit itself to routine tasks of Party diplomacy, as does Andrei Gromyko's Foreign Ministry. I° Probably the International Department has conceptual functions in its special field, within the framework of the long-range CPSU foreign policy strategy, so that great weight must be given to its declarations and actions toward Western Communists. Other departments of the CC Secretariat--for instance the Departments for Foreign Cadres under N. M. Pegov, Propaganda under E. M. Tiazhelnikov, or International Information under L. M. Zamiatin--seem only marginally involved in planning and decisionmaking. The International Department, however, appears to have a relatively close consulting relationship with the Foreign Ministry and its various 9. Cf. Manuel Azc~ate/Carlos Alonso Zaldivar, "Sur les relationsentre le Patti eommuniste d'Espagne et le Particommuniste de l'Union Sovi6tique (1956-1981)," in Lilly Marcou (ed.),L'U.R.S.S. vue de gauche (Paris:Presses Universitairesde France, 1982), p. 247. I0. Cf. Wolfgang Bemer, "Die sowjetische AussenpoHtik der Breshnew-~ra," Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, supplement to Das Parlament (Bonn), XXXI, B 48 (November 28, 1981), p. 35.

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departments, particularly where local Communist Parties have a real influence on the policies of their countries and thus affect their relations with the Soviet Union, directly or indirectly. At any rate, it is notable that Soviet diplomats up to the level of ambassador have in Italy, France, Spain, and J a p a n repeatedly attempted to push the Communist Parties in directions desired by Moscow--whether through covert activity or by open declaration. ~t This could scarcely occur without prior discussions with the International Department. The cooperation between the International Department and the Foreign Ministry in the preparation of the weekly New Times also suggests a close consultative relationship between the two institutions, tz In the following pages I shall investigate certain forms and methods by which the CPSU leadership---represented especially by the International Department--seeks to exert influence over the policy of the Western Communists and particularly the heretics among them. Moscow continues to have no scruples against interfering in the internal affairs of fraternal Parties. Here one sees the sleaziness of Soviet reasoning when it accuses the Western European Communists of illegitimate interference in the internal affairs of the Polish Communists by giving support to the reform movement. Varying Behavior Toward Small and Large Parties In his report to the Twenty-sixth Party Congress, Secretary General Brezhnev admitted with remarkable candor the existence of differences between the CPSU and certain nonruling Communist Parties. The Soviet state and Party chief recommended that these differences be resolved by "patient comradely discussion of the differing views and standpoints. ''13 In reality, however, the leading representatives of the Soviet system do not desire and are not capable of fundamental discussions of ideological-political problems with their critics from Western Parties. They think primarily in terms of power politics, orienting themselves 11. See the section "Forms and Methods of Soviet Influence," below. 12. A third important CC department in this context is the Department for International Information. All things considered, it might not be correct to assess New Times as the semiofficial organ of the Foreign Ministry, as is sometimes done in the West. The International Department presumably exerts greater influence on it. Evidence for this is given by the fact that New Times in the last years heavily attacked leading figures of the "Eurocommunist" Parties such as Carrillo and Azcfuate of the ICE and Pajetta of the ICI. Polemics of this type hardly would be found in New Times if this periodical was actually a sort of organ of the Soviet Foreign Ministry. 13. Pravda, February 24, 1981.

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toward the interests of Soviet raison d'6tat. This is not merely the impression of outside observers but also that of leading representatives of the PCI and the PCE, 14 who base their views on ample experience in this field. For example, Palmiro Togliatti's 1964 proposal of joint CPSU-PCI conferences and seminars on controversial points, which could refine and possibly overcome the two Parties' differences, was characteristically not accepted--and similar Yugoslav proposals had an equally negative outcome. Nor has there ever been any case--as Pajetta has noted--where the Soviet leadership consulted or even informed its fraternal Parties in advance of important decisions to be taken by the CPSU or the U.S.S.R. ~5 On the contrary, in critical situations Moscow has consistently done its best to leave the fraternal Parties in the dark, or even to mislead them. Thus Ponomarev emphatically and indignantly denied any Soviet intention of intervening in Czechoslovakia a few weeks before the actual invasion when approached by PCE leader Azc~rate about rumors of an imminent invasion. PCI Secretary General Luigi Longo was in Moscow immediately before the intervention in Czechoslovakia, conferring with high-ranking CPSU functionaries. They did not inform him of the forthcoming action, and his first information on the invasion came from a telephone call with the PCI Direzione in Rome. 16 The Soviet leadership concentrates essentially on tactical maneuvers in its arguments with Western Communists. The stubbornness with which it pursues its goals is remarkable, and it does not give up in its endeavors even when it undergoes serious reverses. This is plain, for instance, in its attempts to overthrow the PCE leadership group around Carrillo, even though it has failed in this twice already, in 1970 and 1977. The Soviet leadership has, however, without doubt become more flexible in its procedures in the last ten to fifteen years. Some Western Communists attribute this, inter alia, to the notion that the leading politicians in Moscow may have learned something from their negotiations with Western governments during the 1970s, and carry 14. Urban, "Eurocommunism," p. 13. According to Azcl'u'ate, Soviet dogmatism, characterized by a power mentality, is "a sign of great political and ideological weakness"; creative Marxism might be found today "in France, Italy, and even the United States--not the Soviet Union." CL also "La svolta comunista," interview with PCI Direzione member Giorgio Napolitano, Mondoperaio (Rome), XXXIII, 4 (April 1980), p. 6. 15. Alberto Jacoviello, "Un 'animale' comunista oggi," interview with la Repubblica (Rome), June 6, 1982. 16. Interview with Azc~trate, Urban, "Eurocommunism," p. I 1 and Longo's report to the PCI CC, runitd, August 28, 1968.

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over their experience from the international state level to the inter-Party plane. In any case, the Soviet leadership has available a wide variety of tactics for influencing the Western Communists, and can thus accommodate itself flexibly to momentary situations and take account of the differences between the individual Parties. The CPSU leaders have the least problem with unruly small Parties, which have slight means to cope with Soviet pressure and are often directly or indirectly dependent on subsidies from Moscow. ~7 Experience shows that Moscow will first attempt to overthrow the leadership of such Parties by mobilizing rank and file and medium-level cadres. This maneuver was successful in the case of the Austrian Communist Party (KPO) in 1969-1970 and the Norwegian Communist Party (CPN) in 1975--both Parties' leaderships had taken Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia in 1968 as a stimulus to dramatize their own reform policies. Here the Soviets were able to stay in the background, for in a kind of division of labor the East German Party SED took on the heavy work. It carried out an intensive campaign of influence at every level inside the KP0 and CPN, particularly through courses given in the G.D.R. for cadres of both Parties and distribution of pro-Soviet materials to the Party rank and file. This work created the conditions in which the reformers were first forced into the minority and then politically liquidated. ~s The CPSU leadership was not interested in the fact that by this process the previously slight political weight of these Parties was reduced to practically nothing. Where the Soviet leadership does not succeed in changing the policies of small, reform-oriented Parties, it tolerates or favors the process whereby orthodox elements in the Party form factions, secede from the Party, and finally organize splinter Communist Parties. This happened in Australia and in Sweden, where the Socialist Party (in 1971) and the Workers' Party-Communist (1977) made their appearance in competition with the "official" Parties--though neither has so far had any political influence. All this, of course, contradicts Moscow's principle that formation of factions and splitting tactics within a Party are forbidden and certainly may not be promoted from outside. But this in no way hinders the Soviet leadership from taking up relations with the splinter Parties 17. Cf., for example, "Rote Kohlen," Der Spiegel, XXXV, 50 (December 7, 1981), pp. 156, 159. 18. For an account of this process in the Austrian Party see Kurt Seliger, '~SED: Gute Beziehungen zur normalisierten KPO," Deutschland Archly (Cologne), IX, 8 (August 1976), pp. 829-833. The SED maintains particularly close ties with the CPs of German-speaking areas and Scandinavia.

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alongside those with the official Parties once a certain amount of time has elapsed, and even inviting the splinter Parties to Soviet Party congresses. Adherence to its own stated principles is for Moscow less important than having at its disposal, in each country, a reliable mouthpiece for Soviet interests. One reason why the Soviet leadership can engage in such policies with the small Parties is because it knows that their members and activists compensate for their shallow national roots by the consciousness of belonging to a world-girdling movement led by the CPSU. The situation is otherwise with the Communist mass Parties of Italy, France, Spain, and Japan, and calls for more cautious procedure. Moscow knows well that the deep national roots of these Parties strengthen their leaders against external attempts to influence them. Their leaders can count on a profound Party patriotism at the base and among cadres--a patriotism which in some cases can override emotional ties to the country and the Party of the October Revolution. Thus Moscow has so far made no serious attempts to create and support parallel organizations to compete with the big West European CPs. The defection of a major Party from Moscow would entail a loss of prestige and legitimation that would scarcely be compensated for by the founding of a small pro-Soviet splinter group. This statement is not contradicted by the fact that the Soviets entertained relations with the group around Yoshio Shiga, who was expelled from the JCP in 1964. The Shiga group served Moscow merely as a pressure mechanism against the JCP leaders but was never recognized by the CPSU as a counter-CP. After the normalization of CPSU-JCP relations in 1979 the CPSU formally dropped the Shiga group. 19 Using the same logic, the Soviets attempted to prevent General Enrique Lfster from forming a pro-Moscow counter-Party in 1970, 2o and have repeatedly demanded that the orthodox wing of the Finnish CP remain inside the mother Party together with the majority reformists. In Moscow's eyes, so long as there is a strong pro-Soviet group present in a Party it makes more sense to avoid a split and try to condition the leaderships of the big West European Parties by influencing the base and militants--and where possible eventually replacing the leaders, z' 19. Cf. the writings of Peter Bet-ton, "'Japan: Euro-Nippo-Communism," Chap. XV in Vernon Aspaturian, Jiri Valenta, and David P. Burke (eds.), Eurocommunisra Between East and West (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980), pp. 326-362, and "The Japanese Communists' Rapprochement with the Soviet Union," Asian Survey, XX, 12 (December 1980), pp. 1210-1222. 20. Eusebio MujaI-Le6n, in his article in this issue. 21. Cf. my article "Die italienischen Genossen gehen auf Distanz. Zur jiingsten Kontroverse zwischen der KPI und der KPdSU," Osteuropa, XXXII, 6 (June 1982), pp. 443-460.

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The best known example for this latter tactic is Moscow's behavior toward the PCE leadership in 1977, as described by Eusebio MujalLe6n. Here the substance of the attack is less interesting than its timing, which indicates something about possible future Soviet tactics against unruly Western Communists. It is noteworthy that the attack against Carrillo came when the PCE was in a difficult situation. The legendary Party president Dolores Ib,~'ruri, now returned to Spain after a forty-year exile in the Soviet Union, had spoken critically of Eurocommunism, and appeared ready to support those Party cadres who disagreed with Carrillo's reform policy. Furthermore, the 9.2 percent the PCE had won in the June 1977 election had been somewhat below Party expectations. In this complicated situation Moscow seemed to be calculating that a policy quarrel would break out in the PCE which it could both influence and exploit, aiming at isolating and eventually removing Carrillo and his followers. But Soviet policy toward the PCE was obviously also conceived as a warning to the other big West European Parties not to go too far in their search for autonomy and their criticisms of "real Socialism."

Forms and Methods of Soviet Influence In the years after 1977 the Soviet leadership quite openly admitted its intention to influence the line of the disobedient West European Parties by mobilizing their bases against their leaderships. Ponomarev claimed in 1979 that because of the "principled line in the activities of the CPSU" the leaders of the "Eurocommunist" Parties were gradually beginning to recognize that their course was damaging the international Communist movement and their own Parties, while also evoking great dissatisfaction among their members and militants. The CPSU Central Committee would in any case "continue to aid in overcoming deviations from Marxism-Leninism and proletarian internationalism. ''22 Since then Moscow has improved its techniques for such aid, using the carrot-and-stick system convincingly described in this issue by Urban. For example, during critical periods in bilateral relations the Soviets may offer the carrot of desirable continued high-level meetings. The Soviets assume that Western Communist leaders will accept these offers, in part because they lessen the latter's problems with the proSoviet elements in their Parties. Moscow has occasionally used the East European Parties as middlemen in this tactic: the SED when normaliz22. Address to Soviet ideologists, TASS, October 17, 1979. It is interesting that this passage is missing in the Pravda version of his speech, printed on October 18, 1979.

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ing relations with the PCF, the Bulgarian CP in attempts at rapprochement with the PCE, the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party in difficult moments with the PCI. Moscow keeps a considerably larger arsenal of sticks to tame unruly Communists. Aside from the threat of material consequences, there are reminders that Moscow could take up preferential relations with their Socialist rivals, 23 or the weapon of Soviet embassy agitation against critical "Eurocommunists." The Soviet embassy in Madrid agitated against Carrillo and his Party allies; Soviet diplomats in Paris did not just criticize PCF opposition to Charles de Gaulle in private conversations (as Friend notes) but also criticized the Union of the Left when it was formed in 1972. Finally, the Soviet ambassador to Italy has now openly criticized Berlinguer, rejecting his view of Polish events and his consequent negative evaluation of the entire Soviet system. 24 As noted earlier, the Soviets concentrate their main efforts against Communist leaders critical of Moscow by mobilizing the Party base and militants. Often they stay out of the foreground of public polemics, pushing forward orthodox fraternal Parties, particularly the Czechoslovak, Portuguese, Greek (external), and the Argentine CP. This influencing process is both bilateral and multilateral. Bilateral Relations In bilateral relations a multifaceted press polemic is the best known and most frequently chosen means. Often the CPSU leadership attacks individual Western Communists (Azcfirate, Carrillo in the PCE) or well-known publicists (Giuseppe Boffa in the PCI, Jean Elleinstein in the PCF). This tactic has the advantage of signaling disapproval without involving the whole Party leadership. At the same time the tactic is supposed to give the impression that the positions attacked are absurd ones, quite isolated from those of the Party as a whole. As MujalLe6n points out, when this procedure was used against Carrillo it attracted the anger of the PCF, a Party which had usually operated cautiously in its relations with the CPSU and abstained from manifesting solidarity with fraternal Parties under attack. The PCF considered the attack on Carrillo an inadmissible intervention in the domestic affairs 23. In Italy, for example, the CPSU had relations with the PSIUP, a le•socialist group which split off from the PSI in 1963 and merged with the PCI in 1972. Moscow also paid very obvious court to the Spanish PSOE leadership around Felipe Gonz,'flez in the period 1977-1978, cf. Azcftrate, "Sur les relations," p. 248. In Japan the CPSU had analogous contacts with the local Socialists, cf. Berton, "Japan: "Euro-Nippo-Communism," p. 339. 24. See l'Unitfi, December 18, 1981.

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of another Party, an attempt "to separate a secretary-general from his party." Another polemic technique used by CPSU functionaries is to cite pro-Soviet texts by revered Party leaders such as Thorez and Togliatti in order to give the impression that current Party leaders have deviated in opportunistic ways from basic, common ideological-political positions. Articles of this sort are frequently found in the New Times, and, as noted above, are written in the International Department, in close cooperation with the Foreign Ministry. The periodical has long had French and Spanish editions, distributed by the national Soviet Friendship organizations to the Party base; in October 1980 the Soviets began to publish an Italian edition. What PCE Executive Committee member Ignacio Gallego said openly of New Times' function reflects what PCI leaders presumably think--its job is to provide ammunition to pro-Soviet militants and the Party base against reform-oriented leaders. 25 Still another CPSU tactic in dealing with dissident Western Communists is to excise or reformulate unwelcome passages in their addresses, communiquds, and declarations that have to be published in the Soviet press. For example, in Berlinguer's speech to the CPSU Twenty-fifth Party Congress in 1976 the key term "pluralist" (pluralisrico) which Berlinguer used to characterize PCI conceptions on democracy emerged in Pravda as the ideologically noncommital "multiform" (mnogoobraznyi). 2° Another instance was spotted by the Japanese CP. In the course of its discussions on normalizing relations with the CPSU in 1979 it agreed on a joint communiqu6. The Pravda version was found to have omitted a passage which implied Soviet selfcriticism of past relations with the Shiga group. 27 Finally, Azcfirate has pointed out a case where the CPSU leaders even falsified the Pravda version of the final document of the 1969 World Communist Conference. Instead of the jointly-agreed sentence, "The socialist state by drawing its support from the masses of the people, has the right to defend itself," the Soviet translators published, "The socialist state, which draws its support from the masses of the people . . . . " Moscow officials had thus converted an obligation into a mere statement of fact. 28 The CPSU regularly tries to explain away 25. El Pals, January 13, 1981. 26. L'UniM and Pravda, February 28, 1976. The word could have been translated as "pliuralisticheskii." 27. Cf. Berton, "The Japanese Communists," p. 1217. 28. Cf. Azc~'u'ate, "Sur les relations," p. 240 ft.

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such manipulations on the grounds of "technical errors" or "translation difficulties." In reality, these constitute mostly an attempt to retract surreptitiously concessions which it had been forced to make to critical Western Communists. In the appearances of prominent CPSU figures at Western Communist Party congresses the Soviets find a favorable opportunity to speak directly to Party activists and appeal to their emotional ties to the Party of the October Revolution. As a rule they exploit these ties by presenting current Soviet policies as the consistent continuation of Lenin's October policies; any criticism of the Soviet Union today is thus denounced as a sacrilegious attack on the October Revolution. This frequently used artifice--denounced openly by PCE leaders as an abuse of the sentiment of many Party activists29mis cleverly chosen and in general not without effect, as delegate applause demonstrates. CPSU leaders also use their appearances at national Party congresses to show disapproval of the strategies of host Parties. Thus, as Friend notes, Suslov's greeting to the Twentieth PCF Congress in 1972 quite failed to mention the freshly concluded Common Program of the Left. Similarly, Kirilenko's address to the Fourteenth PCI Congress in 1975 was silent on the "historic compromise." This silence on important questions which stood at the center of discussion in those Party congresses constituted an attempt by the CPSU to encourage those elements in the Party critical of the Common Program or the "historic compromise." Finally, one must note the internal letters and memoranda which the top-level officials of the CPSU often dispatch to the executive organs of insubordinate fraternal Parties. In recent years the contents of a number of these letters have been divulged. Their aim is to pressure Party leaders to change their political line, or even to urge the elimination of leaders critical of the Soviets. In the spring of 1976, for example, the CPSU Central Committee sent a letter to the PCF Central Committee which then-insider Francois Hincker termed "very violent." It criticized the resolutions of the recent Twenty-second PCF Congress and called on the French Communists to "wake up," a phrase the PCF leaders interpreted as "a call to fight against the Marchais-Kanapa leadership. ,,30 A year later, top-level 29. Cf. Josd Luis Malo de Molina, "Politica internacional y independencia del partido," Nuestra Bandera (Madrid), XLV, 106 (February 1981), p. 13. 30. Franc~ois Hincker, Le parti communiste au carrefour. Essai sur quinze ans de son histoire 1965-1981 (Pads: Albin Michel, 1981), p. 167. Hincker was a CC member from 1976

to 1979. In 1981 he was expelled from the Party, after having founded--together with the former Pads Party secretary Henri Fiszbin--"Rencontres communistes," a center of critical

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CPSU officials had again intervened by letter, according to Hincker, in an attempt to prevent the imminent PCF approval of the French force de dissuasion. 31 Another example is the letter sent by the CPSU CC to its PCI counterpart in December 1980. 32 This was a reply to a letter sent by the PCI leaders to the CPSU (and to other ruling Parties in Warsaw Pact countries) expressing understanding and sympathy with the independent trade union "Solidarity," and warning against Soviet military intervention in Poland. In its letter the Soviet leadership described the PCI initiative as an interference in Poland's internal affairs and accused the PCI of sympathizing with those forces "that have unleashed a veritable offensive against socialism in Poland." In conclusion, it expressed the hope that "the PCI Direzione will comprehend the significance of events in Poland in the proper way by avoiding biased judgments and by taking into account the points of view of the PZPR and all friends of Poland, peace, and socialism." The most recent example of this type of meddling is the memorandum from the CPSU leadership to the Finnish Communist leaders which Politburo member Arvid Pelshe read to a delegation of Finnish Communists in May 1982. 33 In this l 1-page text, the Soviet leaders expressed their "serious concern" over the "extremely difficult situation" within the Finnish Party, effectively split between reformers and traditionalists. They reproached the reform-oriented majority of the Finnish CP for cooperating "rather too closely" with the bourgeois parties, and acused them of adopting anti-Soviet positions and carrying on a witch-hunt against those sections of the Party which defended Marxism-Leninism. The memorandum went on to say that certain trends and facts indicate that the Finnish CP is in danger of losing its Marxist-Leninist character, which would have "adverse consequences of a long-term nature on Finnish-Soviet friendship and cooperation." All this was clearly aimed at strengthening the position of the Sovietline minority in the Finnish Party leadership in the coming Party congress. PCF members. Politburo member Jean Kanapa, who died in September 1978, was credited within the PCF leadership with the promotion of a Eurocommunist line aiming at total independence from Moscow. 31. Ibid., p. 169. The CC report of Kanapa explaining the new orientation of the PCF in regard to the force de dissuasion is printed in l'Humanitd, May 16, 1977. 32. La Repubbliea, February 14, 1981. The letter was leaked to the Italian weekly Panorama (Rome). Both the CPSU and the PCI rejected the responsibility for this indiscretion but did not deny the anthentieity of the letter. 33. Cf. Le Monde, May 14, 1982, and l'Unitd, May 23, 1982. The existence of the letter and part of its contents became known to the public during the Twentieth Congress of the Finnish CP.

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Of course in all three of these cases CPSU interference was unsuccessful-what it did was to mobilize Party patriotism among activists. The PCF Central Committee responded with indignation to the call for the overthrow of its leader, and immediately after the Soviet letter had been read out reaffirmed its confidence in Marchals. 34 The PCI leaders did not let the Soviet letter stop them from continuing to give covering fire to the Polish reform movement, or from sharply condemning actions in Poland in the wake of the December 13 coup. 35 In Finland, Moscow's interference in the Communists' internal affairs weakened the orthodox current in the Party. A few days later the pro-Soviet faction lost further ground in the Twentieth Party Congress' elections to leadership organs, while the officials singled out by name for criticism in Moscow's memorandum were without exception returned to office. 36 In his farewell address outgoing Party Chairman Aarne Saarinen said in reproach of the CPSU that its meddling in internal Finnish CP affairs showed complete lack of understanding for the course of development within Finnish Communism and Finland itself, or utter ignorance of it. 37 The reactions of French and Italian Communists to Soviet interference show that the same can be said of the Soviet leadership's attitudes toward the other fraternal Parties. Multilateral Relations

The multilateral activities of the CPSU officials are closely tied to their bilateral maneuvers. They use the instrument of Communist conferences to make the other Communist Parties---in particular the heretics among them--toe the Moscow line. In times of improving East-West relations, the Soviet leaders have used conferences to try to keep the climate of d6tente from influencing the basic ideological and political conceptions of the fraternal Parties and giving them the impression that the struggle against imperialism was receding into the background. This was a basic reason for CPSU interest in the convocation of the Third Communist World Conference in Moscow in 1969. In times of heightening East-West tension, however, the Soviet leaders wish to close the ranks of the Communist movement and commit the fraternal Parties to support the Soviet bloc in its struggle against the imperialist 34. Hincker, "Le patti," p. 167. 35. Cf. the resolution of the PCI Direzione, rUnitd, December 30, 1981. 36. Neue Z~rcher Zeitung, May 20 and 21, 1982, and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, May 17, 1982. 37. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, May 18, 1982.

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camp. This is one of the central objectives of the latest CPSU proposal for a new world conference of CPs. Until just a few years ago Moscow could assume that the majority of the dissident leaderships could not go beyond delaying tactics and refuse altogether to attend multilateral conferences. This gave the Soviets the instrument they needed to work out final communiqufs that largely conformed to their own requirements. At preparatory meetings they marshalled the Soviet-line majority against critical minorities, attempted to prevent coalitions among the autonomists, organized multiParty caucuses to condemn positions critical of Soviet practices, and belabored unruly Parties in private talks, trying to force them to retract motions calling for changes in the draft resolutions. 38 After all, they said, resistance was directed "against a country with 200 million inhabitants and against a party that likewise numbered millions of members," to cite Brezhnev's reproach to the Spanish delegation behind the scenes at the Third World Conference when the PCE insisted on using its address to the plenary session to condemn the intervention in Czechoslovakia. 39 This pressure tactic against the autonomists has, however, become ineffective since the CPSU was forced to accede to the consensus principle in the preliminaries to the 1976 East Berlin conference of European CPs. For this principle in effect gives each participant Party a fight of veto in formulating joint resolutions, thus overruling once and for all the former practice of "democratic centralism" at the level of multilateral relations among CPs. Thus the CPSU can count today less than ever on the critical Parties. If they attend future multilateral Communist conferences at all they may well refuse to underwrite the final Soviet-style communiquf. The CPSU has apparently drawn its conclusions from this situation and has been developing new variants of old tactics in recent years. In the past, Moscow used to postpone plans for international Communist conferences when soundings suggested that important Parties would not attend, or would attach conditions to their appearance. This happened with the Third Word Communist Conference, proposed in 1963 and held only in 1969. Today, as shown by the preparation and proceedings of the Pads conference of CPs in spring, 1980, 40 the CPSU insists on carrying out multilateral meetings, although it knows 38. Aze6rate, "Sur les relations," p. 235 ft. 39. Ibid., p. 241 ft. 40. Sec my "Neue Tendenzen im europ~ischen Kommunismus," Europa-Archly (Bonn), XXXV, 14 (July 25, 1980), pp. 448-456.

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quite well that relevant Parties might not attend. The same can be said for the project of a Fourth World Communist Conference, launched in early 1981 by various loyal Parties but rejected by the PCI, PCE, and JCP. This betokens a new Soviet tactic--namely to isolate unruly Western Parties rather than to try to integrate them in the common movement at the price of curtailing Soviet concepts. The basic consideration is that a convincing vote by the great majority of Communist Parties in favor of Soviet positions could show up the leaders of the absent Western Parties to their own members as persons hesitant in the central questions of peace and war, preferring to cooperate with the bourgeoisie and the Chinese "warmongers" rather than with the Soviet Union and the Socialist camp. The Moscow line for the periodical Worm Marxist Review shows the same orientation. Ninety Communist and Workers' Parties cooperate in the editorial tasks. For a long time the periodical, which under its Soviet managing editor Zarodov keeps a strictly Moscow-oriented course, was content to work only through its journalistic activity. Since the mid-1970s it has considerably enlarged its field of activity by turning its editorial meetings into regular Communist conferences, against the objections of the PCI. 41 Obviously the CPSU has moved here too from a policy of organizational-political integration of the critical Western Parties to one of enforcing political isolation and marginal status. Future Prospects It is quite possible that reform-oriented tendencies exist in the Soviet community of think-tanks and Party institutes and even among Party cadres, advocating more flexible behavior toward Western Communists. Here it is worth noting how freely discussions are carried on with PCI leaders in the Party institutes. When Pajetta and Paolo Bufalini were in Moscow for the Twenty-sixth Party Congress, they were given the opportunity to expound PCI views on world problems to a group of • • 42 several hundred persons at the Institute of Social Scmnces. There they were questioned intensively On PCI views about China, Afghani41. Cf. Michele Rossi, "The International Situation and the Stand of the Italian Communists," World Marxist Review (Toronto), Vol. 22, No. 3 (March 1979), pp. 47-51. The JCP also protested the bias of the periodical in several open letters to its editors, threatening consequences. See Akahata, January 12, 1981, and February 15, 1981. 42. This Party Institute for Social Sciences is under the CPSU CC's Academy for Social Sciences.

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start, the Paris Conference of Communists, the PCI's "new internationalism," and other topics. 43 Naturally, it is difficult to determine from the outside whether the questions were prepared or spontaneous, whether posed with provocative intent or out of genuine interest. Thus one should not overestimate the effect of such meetings--which have become remarkably common in recent years and have also drawn important leaders from Social Democratic and Socialist parties. 44 Still, it cannot be excluded that the theses expounded by the reformist Left have a certain effect, at least among think-tank and institute members. The question is, however, whether such tendencies will in the long run show themselves important at the leadership level, in plans and decisionmaking. The author tends toward skepticism--not least after analyzing the way in which Moscow reacted to the most recent fundamental criticisms by PCI leaders. 45 Soviet procedures in this case are like those described earlier: there is no real discussion of the content of PCI arguments. Instead, the CPSU appeals to the still-existent pro-Soviet sentiment within the PCI. Monstrous, "really blasphemous" attempts are being made to blacken the Soviet Union, chief bastion of peace and Socialism, said Pravda; the social system of real Socialism, which guarantees extensive freedoms and develops "programs which give wings to the imagination," is being insulted with arguments taken from the arsenal of the imperialist class enemy. 46 Thus the CPSU attempts in its usual way to influence the base and militants in the PCI in order to condition its leadership, to roll back a development in the PCI that Moscow considers disastrous. At any rate, it is no accident that the Pravda article attacks the "leaders" or "leadership" of the PCI, but not the Party as a whole. 47 Will Moscow break relations in the near future with the large, disobedient Western Parties, and attempt to create pro-Soviet counterParties? Here one must differentiate among the individual Parties: the 43. Renzo Foa, "Da Pajetta e Bufalini in un dibattito per le scienze sociali: Ribadite a Mosca le posizioni del PCI," rUnitd, March 3, 1981. 44. Thus the French Socialist leader Francois Mitterrand spoke in 1975 to the Moscow Institute for World Economy and International Relations, while Spanish Socialist leader Gonz~lez spoke before the Moscow Institute of the International Workers' Movement in 1977. Both Institutes are under the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. 45. Cf. the articles in Pravda, January 24 and February 13, 1982, and in Komraunlst, LIX, 2 (January 1982) and No. 4 (March 1982). The resolution of the PCI Direzione is in l'Unitd, December 30, 1981. 46. "Vopreki interesam mira i sotsializma," Pravda, January 24, 1982. 47. Ibid.

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PCE, which has made a sharp and fundamental criticism of Moscow's policies similar to that of the PCI, is in the midst of a serious programmatic and organizational crisis. The CPSU must conclude that this raises the chances for a splitting operation. Things are different with the PCI. Secretary General Berlinguer has understood the steps in the process of transforming the PCI from a Muscovite Party to one that is politically and culturally Western, without permitting traumatic divergences and breaks within it. In this case the CPSU leaders will keep their options open. They already have a lot to do in Poland and Afghanistan. They have opened a polemic against the "opportunism" and "liquidationism" of the PCI. But they dislike impulsive actions, such as Khrushchev's policies toward China, Albania, and Yugoslavia. They prefer caution, and will probably avoid a third schism--this time with the largest and most influential Communist Party in Western Europe. One should thus consider that the Soviet leadership will continue its maneuvers a~ainst the critical Western Parties for a rather long time. It is an open question whether it will succeed in reversing developments in some Parties. The examples of the PCI and the PCE, however, make it plain that the Soviets can no longer uphold one fiction that they hold dear--that there still exists an all-encompassing, relatively united pro-Moscow Communist movement.