Salient. Newspaper of Victoria University of Wellington Students Association. Vol 41 No. 6. April 3 1978

"The Left Defeated"

" The Left Defeated"

If the FCP is not "left" then the "defeat of the left" view of the French election needs some reviewing.

Internally the FCP-Socialist Party Alliance offered some wage increases and the dubious prospect of nationalisation of some key industries. Externally they offered a new partner for the brotherhood of Soviet foreign policy.

Of these two differences they gave from the ruling coaltion the more significant is the prospect of support for Soviet foreign policy. The key issue facing France and the rest of western Europe is its likely use as a battlefield for the two superpowers to play out a third world war. In particular the military threat posed by the Soviet Union, and cloaked by calls to make detente irreversible", is increasing daily. It is imperative that western European governments see this danger and prepare their countries to meet it.

Looked at in this light the election of the FCP-FSP alliance would only have disarmed the French people's struggle against the threat of being embroiled in a war between the two superpowers and in particular of organising against the military threat posed by the Soviet Union. This is cause enough to seriously doubt that the "defeat for the left" was anything of the sort. Given the choice of a black cat and a white cat the french people have chosen one with a better attitude to hegemonism.