The wounds of glasnost: some on the American left find glasnost a profound relief; no longer do they have to choose between intellectual integrity and support for Moscow - includes related article

National Review, Nov 24, 1989 by Arch Puddington

The question of global revolution is especially crucial for American leftists, since most of them seem to have realistically concluded that the struggle for fundamental changes in American society is an exercise in futility. The key period was the mid 1970s, when it became clear that despite inflation and rising unemployment, the strength of the American system made it effectively invulnerable to serious radical challenge. By contrast, possibilities for imposing socialist systems on luckless Third World societies seemed to grow, what with post-Vietnam America's uncertainty about its proper world role. The vision of stimulating "many Vietnams" seemed altogether realistic, given Communist inroads in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Central America, and the Caribbean. Thus, while the Left might ritualistically castigate America over poverty, homelessness, and racial injustice, it was slogans like "Hands Off El Salvador" that pumped up the adrenalin.

True enough, many who declared solidarity with the Sandinistas were quick to profess abhorrence of Eastern European-style Communism; and some, the less sophisticated, really believed that Soviet power and Central American revolution were unconnected. The truth, of course, is that, as Saul Landau, an IPS stalwart, once observed: "The Soviet Union is the best guarantee of Third World revolution."

AT LEAST that was the case until recently. While Soviet deeds have not exactly matched Soviet words, the direction seems clearly toward disengagement from the Ortegas and Mengistus, and the forging of new ties with countries enjoying economic and strategic significance: Japan, Argentina, even South Korea. Perhaps the most jarring development has been an apparent Soviet shift in attitude toward South Africa. While unlikely to produce a Moscow-Pretoria detente, Soviet policies suggest expanded trade with South Africa and a distancing from the African National Congress. Third Worldists in the United States have reacted to these stirrings with growing hysteria; a writer in the radical Guardian has already accused Moscow of adopting a policy of constructive engagement in its relations with South Africa.

Even more disquieting than tentative and inconclusive actions like the South African opening have been Soviet rhetorical emphasis on common human values as opposed to global class struggle, and hard-nosed analyses by Soviet foreign-policy officials dismissing past attempts to stimulate socialism in the Third World as a colossal blunder. The Guardian drew howls of anguish by publishing an article by Andrei V. Kozyrev, a high official in the Soviet Foreign Ministry, who wrote of developing countries suffering "not so much from capitalism, but from a lack of it" and criticized Soviet involvement in regional conflicts as "hindering the establishment of mutually advantageous ties with the West."

For the United States, Moscow's new thinking in foreign policy presents a far greater challenge than when the prime goal seemed to be shoring up a series of economically bankrupt despotic regimes. For the hard Left, however, the result is catastrophic. Saul Landau's uncharacteristically candid remark reflects the reality that the cause of "national liberation" hardly exists unless the big battalions of the USSR are behind it. Just compare the prospects of El Salvador's FMLN, which continues to enjoy Soviet-Cuban-Nicaraguan support, and those of the New People's Army of the Philippines, which soldiers on without outside assistance.