National Sovereignty in Eastern Europe

Grey River Argus, 9 August 1948, Page 5

National Sovereignty in Eastern Europe

LONDON, August 2 Mr W. N. Ewer writes: —The Cominform’s excommunication of Marshal Tito, and his colleagues, and its call to Yugoslav Communists to revolt and remove their present leaders, opens up a conflict decisive for the future of Eastern Europe. There has even since the war. and the creation of the Soviet bloc been a deep contradiction between avowed Soviet policy and the avowed Communist doctrine. The Soviet Government has again and again protested its belief in national independence and national sovereignty. At Yalta it solemnly affirmed, “the right of all/ ipeoples to choose the form of government under which they will live”. And in all controversy about the Marshall Plan, the reiterated Soviet thesis has been that Russia was the champion of sovereign rights and of the sovereign independence of the smaller countries of Europe. It is laid down in the declaration issued last autumn when the Cominform was founded that: “The Communist Parties must take into their hands the defence of the national independence and sovereignty of their own countries.”

Yet, at the same time, it has been the Communist doctrine that every Communist must on every issue follow the “correct line”. And on every issue the “correct line” is laid down by Stalin. For orthodox Communism is “Stalinism.” The two terms are interchangeable. And to disagree with Stalin is—by the very definition—a heresy against Stalinism. So the head of any Communist controlled Government is, since his State is “sovereign and independent,” fully entitled to act independently of and even contrary to the wishes of Joseph Stalin, as head of the Soviet Government. But if he does so, he is, as a Communist, guilty of heresy against Joseph Stalin, the supreme and ultimate lawgiver and decided of Communist orthodoxy and Communist truth.

Until now the contradiction has been resolved simply enough. Communist leaders have used their freedom in faithful obedience to the wishes of the Kremlin. They have voluntarily embraced servitude in the full exercise of their “sovereignty and independence.”

But sooner or later a clash .was sure to come. And it has come in Yugoslavia. Marshal Tito, temperamentally the most self-assertive; the least inclined to subservience of all the Communist chiefs —and the only one who does not owe his position to Moscow — has dared to disagree with Stalin. He has refused to accept “advice” or to obey orders. He has acted as though Yugoslav independence were a reality. The Cominform communique is vague and deliberately confusing as to the real issues which brought about the rupture. Almost certainly Tito’s project in a great Balkan federation under his own leadership was one. Very probably his desire —dictated by Yugoslavia’s urgent needs—for closer economic relations with the “capitalist world” was another. Tito has an old grievance about what he regarded as Russia’s betrayal in 1946 of Yugoslavia’s claim to annex Trieste. But all this is of minor importance. The essential fact is that Marshall Tito, a communist premier, has revolted against the control of Moscow. It is, in Communist eyes an act of schism and of heresy. Excommunication was the logical sequel. Now equally logically the matter must be handed over to the secular nower. The Cominform calls upon all “healthy Communists” in Yugoslavia to remove the Marshal from power. But such an attempt has not the least chance of success, unless backed by the armed power of the Soviet Union —either in action or menacingly visible. d J And so, the puncture takes its true character. The Cominform’s role is incidental—a mere tactical • episode. The real conflict is between the Soviet Government and the Yugoslav Government. The real issue is whether the Yugoslav Government can retain any shred of “national independence anil sovereignty” or must in all its policies internal and external, obey unquestioningly whatever orders it receives from Moscow. Whatever the upshot of the conflict. —even if it were swiftly settled by a Yugoslav capitulation—the disturbing effect upon men’s minds in afl the satellite countries must be profound. For the issue has been openly posed. Russia’s claim to exert absolue control and to expect blind obedience from all satellite countries, from all Commun-ist-controlled countries, has been nakedly revealed.