EDITORIAL

Freeze arms, create jobs

Millions of people the world over, like Canadians, are marching in mass demonst- rations for nuclear disarmament, for an end to the threat of nuclear war.

The labor movement, in all the countries of widespread unemployment, is fighting back against economic strangulation, for jobs, in defence of people’s living stan- dards.

No wonder these streams come together against the same enemies, No wonder they embrace as well the many struggling in de- fence of human rights. Their objectives are irrevocably intertwined.

Scientific estimates of the radioactive ruin that would be wrought by nuclear war, annihilating the human race, are well known. The threat preys on the minds of even the children. People everywhere are saying no to nuclear war.

Whatis logical and human and needed at once is a freeze on nuclear production and deployment — an atmosphere for serious negotiations. While there remains parity between East and West there can be hope of mutual agreements.

But so-called “deterrence” at ever- higher aggregates of destructiveness offers little hope. On the one hand is the increas- ing danger that U.S. first-strike strategy or one of the many other scenarios for trig- gering a war will indeed set the missiles of doom flying.”

On the other hand is the purchase of “deterrence” at the cost of life’s necessities — jobs, homes, health care, education and science (for progress, not annihilation).

It is now widely acknowledged that dis- armament, far from being a threat to jobs, is a virtual pre-condition for recovery. The inflationary effects of military expen- ditures inhibit developmental capital in- vestment. And capital invested in the civi- lian sector provides more jobs, more buy-

ing power, than the same amount sunk in war industry.

The figures are not new, but still impres- sive. A $1-billion investment in the milit- ary, (in U.S. terms) would produce as few as 14,000 jobs in the defence industry, or as many as 65,000 in retail trade, reports the Labor Research Association of New York. In other sectors $1-billion would generate these jobs: education — 62,000, hospitals — 48,000, apparel manufacturing — 28,000, fabricated metals — 16,000. In other terms, 1,000 teachers’ salaries for a year equal one F-16 fighter; $4-billion for higher education equals two B-1 bombers. And the monstrous squandering of the re- sources and energy of our planet on war material is fatal.

The arithmetic of the U.S. military- industrial complex to which Canada is shackled is relentless. As the jobless in- crease, the rich corporations get richer. In 1980, the 10 biggest war-goods contractors for the Pentagon, got one-third of all milit- ary contracts, led by General Dynamics (5.5 per cent of all contracts), McDonnell Doug- las (5.1 percent), United Technologies (4.0 per cent), General Electric (3.2 per cent) and Lockheed (2.8 per cent).

Besides that, in the USA as here, there are favored regions in the employment scramble. Sixty per cent of Pentagon con- tracts went to 10 states, led by California, New York, Texas and Connecticut. So much for the benefits of feeding the milit- ary gluttons.

_The slogans for Canadians are clear: Re- fuse the Cruise! — Declare Canada a nu- clear weapons-free zone! — Halt the deployment of Cruise and Pershing II mis- siles in Europe!

From the amalgamated forces of peace and labor let there be a resounding de- mand for a nuclear freeze and negotiations oriented on a disarmament agreement.

Stop deployment, negotiate!

Deployment of new U.S. nuclear missiles in western Europe, if it is allowed to hap-

pen, may be the final reckless military pro-—

vocation on the road to nuclear oblitera- tion.

The deployment of the Cruise and Pershing II in west European countries in

Rude intrusion

U.S. Ambassador Paul Robinson is once more instructing Canada on how to run its affairs. He doesn’t want Gander, Nfid., used as a refuelling stop for Soviet planes bound for Cuba. He considers that they’re carrying “spare parts and other equipment that can be used in a military sense,” and says pointedly: “We don’t like that.”

His evidence? Well, what loudmouth of the Reagan ruling circles needs evidence? He’s just telling it to us, that’s all.

Legal, international agreements entered into by the Canadian Government come second to the rude interference from this contemptible intruder. Not even consi- dered, of course, is the fact that Canada signs such agreements for Canada’s own benefit. What does Robinson care about the incomes and jobs for Newfoundlanders where the unemployment rate is 20%?

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 26, 1983—Page 4

December, as planned, would - be tan-

‘tamount to blasting the Geneva talks aimed

at limiting European-based medium range missiles. What is needed is a prolongation of those talks.

However, the Soviet Union has made it clear that it will not sit and discuss limita-

_ tion or reduction while the USA is putting a

six-minute fuse on missiles. targeted on Soviet cities and defence installations.

Deployment is guaranteed to trigger a

Soviet program to match the U.S. threat with both forward-based missiles in eastern Europe and missiles with a 10-minute de- livery time to the USA itself.

Prime Minister Trudeau warned of the danger of confrontation. He should be pressed to join Greece’s Papandreou, Swe- den’s Palme and social democratic spokes- men in West Germany and call for no deployment — no tipping of the scales to-

ward. war. As Britain’s Winston Churchill .

once observed: “Better jaw, jaw, jaw than war, war, war.”

Our own government, and contending political parties, must now get the message to renounce support for deployment of the Cruise and Pershing II, and to call, without asking for Washington’s approval, for productive negotiations to rid humankind of the nuclear war threat.

NO TO NUCLEAR ARMS

Flashbacks

25 years 50 years |

ECONOMIC COMPETITION

A call for increased “give and take” relations and peaceful competition be- tween Canada and the Soviet Union was made last week by a spokesman for 32 top busi- ness executives who visited the USSR earlier this year.

The coexistence appeal was made by Walter McLaughlan, one of A.V. Roe’s vice- presidents, to a capacity audi- ence in Toronto who turned

out to see the film “Canadian:

Businessmen in the USSR”.

McLaughlan stressed that —

both were northern coun- tries: “We have many things in common in developing the natural resources of our northern regions,” he said, and called for economic not military competition on a give and take basis. Tribune, October 27, 1958

NAZI AGENT CHASED OUT

Hitler’s supporters in Canada got a rude shock heré last week when workers preé- sent took control of a Toronto meeting organized by the “Friends of the New Gerf- many” and chased the naz agents from the hall.

This is a decisive defeat for Mr. Spanknoebel, the chief nazi organizer who has bee? sent to America to organiz€ | the German fascist movement in Canada and the USA. ;

After the speaker said the meeting’s purpose was to OF ganize the Germans in Cana da, one worker took the floot to ask about the bloody repression of workers by Ht tler. The meeting was then converted into a demon stration against fascism.

The Worket October 28, 1933

The crisis is over; profits are zooming! Northern Telecom Ltd., Mississauga, had a nine-month after-tax profit of $159.3-million for the period ended Sept. 30. Compare that with the same period year earlier when net take was $88.9-million and see who capital ism exempts from “restraint”.

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN Associate Editor — DAN KEETON Business and Circulation Manager — PAT O'CONNOR

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