Sino-Soviet Dispute is Basically Ideological

"The Sino-Soviet dispute is basically an ideological dispute," claimed Trotskyist Hec McNeil in a talk to the Socialist Club. The dispute is conducted in language reminiscent of medieval theological disputations and the subtle nuances of the arguments can only be appreciated by Kremlin commissars or Vatican cardinals. A student of the dispute was faced with the difficulty that it was never conducted on an open level and thus events which appeared to be of little significance to the layman were of vital importance to the expert.

The speaker outlined the three major areas of disagreement between the two communist giants. The Chinese he argued espoused the Trotskyist position on the question of the role of "national bourgeois revolutions" in preserving world peace. These, they felt, should be supported as they weakened the strength of the "imperialist camp" (U.S., England, etc.), and thus aided the world revolution and the triumph of the "peace-loving socialist bloc" (China. USSR, etc.).

The Chinese also opposed the Russian concept of the changed nature of imperialism. They state that the intervention of the U.S. in Laos, its support for the "reactionary clique" of Diem in Vietnam and Chiang in Taiwan and its provocative behaviour over the Berlin issue showed that it had not changed its aim of dominating the world by military means.

Finally the Chinese disagree with the Russian claim that the strength of the Communist bloc had brought the leaders of the West to the realisation that they could not defeat the Communist countries in armed conflict.

These issues were ideological, the speaker claimed, and there was no truth in the statement that they are merely the surface representations of a conflict of interest on a power level.