Answer to star wars THE IMPACT of Gorbachov's peace proposals has shown how effective principled political initiatives directed at the masses in the Western countries could be. Despite their limitations, they already make it clear that Moscow is essentially in a defensive position in the arms race.
Coming in the context of a new thrust in the activity of the Western peace movement, Gorbachov's proposals have thrown the Western governments off balance.
Among other things, he called the bluff of the Dutch government, which claimed that it would allow deployment of cruise missiles only in response to Soviet missile deployment.
What is new in the Soviet proposals is that they represent a coherent overall approach, calling for rather radical arms reductions. In this respect, they are a condemnation of the policy followed by the bureaucracy up till now.
As significant as this new course of the bureaucracy is, it nonetheless remains a strictly diplomatic offensive in the context of state-to-state relations. Thus, the activists of the independent peace movements in the East, in the USSR in particular, who advocated just such unilateral measures remain in prison.
The bureaucracy is capable of turnarounds of this sort when the circumstances require it, as in this case when the problems of the Soviet economy make it more difficult for them to compete with the US in the arms race. However, the bureaucracy is totally incapable of stimulating by its policy an authentic mass movement for peace that would attack the real cause of the imperialist military drive - the survival of the capitalist drive - the survival of the capitalist system itself.
Gorbachov can put up a good front as a presentable state leader, but he will never focus the hopes and struggles of the workers and the youth. His aim is not the extension of the socialist revolution but "peaceful coexistence" with the imperialist states.
The means the Soviet chief looks to are not mass mobilization but a diplomatic chess game with the imperialist leaders. If any proof of that were needed, the hard lot of the independent peace activists in the East is testimony enough.
Yann Menez Mikil omational Viewpoint 28 October 198: