That Leaflet

THAT LEAFLET

`Solidarity` feels the full text of the leaflet distributed (in Russian) at the recent World Disarmament Congress in Moscow, should go on record, in view of the widespread repercussions (and deliberate lies) it has evoked.

The following notes are based on a report by Dave Picton, one of the members of the London Committee of 100, who took the leaflets to Moscow.

On July 10, two of us gave out the first batch of leaflets in Gorky Street. They were taken eagerly and folded away in inside pockets…. Because of the litter laws. After we had distributed quite a number, we were stopped by three `volunteer auxiliary militia`, who only became friendly after a passer-by that we were Congress delegates. The first (administrative) reflex had been to arrest us. The second (equally administrative) reflex had been to be friendly to an official foreign delegation. Obviously a dialectical contradiction. Neither reflex was related to the content of what we were distributing. That kind of response only took place later, at a higher level.

We also distributed the leaflet at a factory gate. It was an engineering works, in the suburbs. We distributed as the workers were returning from dinner break. The leaflets were again all taken and pocketed.

We also distributed the leaflet through letter boxes in a nearby block of workers’ flats. A second `block of flats` we entered turned out to be a police station. We decided not to stay.

Certain members of the British delegation became quite hostile after reading the leaflet. Late one night, one of the delegates found a woman in his room. His opinion of the Conference Arrangements Committee soared… till he found she was English – and that she was tearing up his leaflets. `Any method is justified against you people!`, she claimed. Unfortunately for her, she had found the wrong leaflet.

The Chairman of the Soviet Peace Committee (Mr. Korneichuk) at one point asked for an assurance that the leaflets would no longer be distributed, despite an earlier agreement that we could put our case by any means we chose.

`The Guardian` gave the best coverage. A front-page article titled `Heresy in Moscow` by Victor Zorza (12.7.62) quoted nearly all of the text which it called `the most direct challenge to official Soviet policies and ideas to have been presented to the Soviet man in the street since freedom of speech died under Stalin`. The article referred with glee to the `blasphemy of blaming Lenin, the best refuge of the reformed Khruschevites, for ideas Stalin put into practice`.

In general the Press reports on the leafleting and on the demonstration in Red Square were remarkably sympathetic. Only Peter Simple, in the `Daily Telegraph` (13.7.62) objected to a `direct incitement to revolution in the Communist world`. He believed that `a campaign of illegal opposition to one government, on one issue, was being exploited by those who want to organise illegal opposition to all governments, on all issues. The anarchist face of the CND is beginning to show`.

This enthusiasm for the Committee’s activities in Moscow was only matched by the same newspapers’ hostility to the Committee’s activities in England. This discrepency was quickly pointed out by `The Daily Worker` (16.7.62), by Arnold Kettle in a letter to `The Guardian`(20.7.62), etc.,etc. There was however another side to this particular coin. Committee of 100 demonstrations in this country have been praised to the skies by the Soviet Press and Radio. The `The Daily Worker` had also offered encouragements, from a safe distance. But now `Pravda` (18.7.62) screamed at the `people who act like thieves`, the `smart Alecks` who discussed `offensive subjects` and `thrust provocative, slanderous, leaflets` at passers-by. And the `Daily Worker` had hysterics about the `insulting, anti-socialist diatribe` and `the distribution of such outrageous lies` by an `irresponsible group`. Readers of both papers had to contain their curiosity about the nature of the lies so violently denounced. Not a line, not a single word of the leaflet was quoted.

During the Congress the text of the leaflet was beamed into Russia in twelve different Soviet languages. Many journals of the socialist and peace movement quoted it extensively. The full text has been republished and circulated by various organisations, including an (intendedly!) private employers’ information service. It has been translated and distributed in France and circulated in Japanese by members of the Zengakuren1 . Copies have gone to Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy and other countries. At least 3 batches have been used in different parts of Yugoslavia. In Helsinki, at the `World Youth Congress`, there was a punch-up on the distributors of the leaflets by members of the Rumanian delegation. Zengakuren representatives, including their President, Itoshi Nemoto, later demonstrated in Red Square, on August 6. Their bulletin No.3 (September ‘62) states this was `inspired by the activities of the Committee 100` and was `our first attempt to appeal to and unite with the workers and people of the USSR`. They attempted to distribute leaflets and were `beaten and dragged behind the Lenin mausoleum, and detained there for an hour`.

• 1All-Japan Federation of Autonomous Student Bodies.