Awkward Responses

The world of Communism stirred under the wind of change. Every day the world saw some new Soviet gesture. The most dramatic last week was Russia's announcement of a sizable cutback in its armed forces. Added to that, hardly a day passed without some new witticism from Nikita Khrushchev, some new revision of history, some political prisoner rehabilitated, some old scoundrel exposed. Every gesture may yet prove a fraud, or the Kremlin's masters--finding that small concessions lead to wider demands--may try to take it all back and revert to proved severities. But it was no longer enough to mock each concession as unreal, or to greet each one with the declaration that the Communists are still tyrants (which they are), or that the West must keep its guard up (which it must).

A feeling that the West's response is inadequate was widespread last week. Editorialists from London to Rome to San Francisco brooded over it. Konrad Adenauer bemoaned the West's inability to speak with one voice (see below). Britain's Socialist leader, Hugh Gaitskell, visiting the U.S., complained that the West's reactions to new Russian tactics seem "less united, less certain and less clear" than they once were. The cold war may not have thawed, but its terms have changed. Too often the West seems to be answering a challenge no longer posed, or, at least, posed in different terms.

A drastic overhauling was due in three areas:

Allies: The confused babble of voices raised in response to the Russian announcement of an arms cut (see below) showed how far out of touch the Allies have become.

Neutrals: Six years ago, faced with war in Korea and the threat that it might spread, the U.S. had demanded that every nation stand up and be counted--a demand which some of Asia's prideful new nations resented and resisted. The Korean war is long over, and it is time to dismantle some of the framework it imposed. A welcome sign of change: Washington's cordiality to Indonesia's neutralist President Sukarno (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS).

Communist Territories: From all outward signs, the Kremlin's men intend to encourage some form of controlled nationalism in the satellites (a process not to be confused with Titoism, which was an uncontrollable revolt). Within Russia the Kremlin has reduced the work week from 48 to 46 hours, released thousands of political prisoners from internment, raised pensions for the aged and disabled, and sought to modify some of the strains of the Stalin era. Since this is good business for the Communist leaders, who hope to get more productivity out of the beneficiaries, the West has found such gestures awkward to reply to. Russia skillfully seeks to magnify every concession; the West instinctively tries to minimize them.

The future will tell whether the Communists can safely loosen the leash while making it more secure; or whether the demands of the classes they must educate to staff their industrial expansion will prove harder and harder to satisfy without major modifications of Communist practice. But the Soviet concessions, however overdue and inadequate, are an easement to millions of hard-pressed subjects. As such, they are not necessarily defeats for the West, though the West tends to make them so.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.