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p The relation between the U.S.S.R. and the capitalist world is one of the most pressing problems today. Socialist foreign policy had to undergo fundamental elaboration on matters of principle in order to cope with the radically new international situation that resulted from the October Revolution. The major immediate aim was to preserve and strengthen the Soviet Republic, bolster its economy and undertake practical steps to build socialism. Soviet foreign policy was therefore dovetailed to the fulfilment of these aims: it had 278 to secure conditions of peaceful coexistence with the capitalist states so as to provide the best international climate for the building of socialism in one country.

p That the new Soviet Republic intended to pursue a revolutionary new policy showed in its complete break with the policy of tsarism and the Russian bourgeoisie, its relentless exposure of the imperialist war and its predatory designs, and in the very first document issued by the Soviet government, the Decree on Peace, which demanded a democratic and just peace without annexations or indemnities. This Decree expressed the very heart and major principles of socialist foreign policy; it also showed the way to resolving international issues, the chief of which at that time was to bring the world war to an end. It embodied the key features of socialist diplomacy: clear and precise definitions precluding any possibility of distortion or falsification, readiness to give other proposals careful consideration, repudiation of secret diplomacy, and direct appeal to other peoples as well as to their governments.

p Summing up the results of Soviet foreign policy, Lenin said in 1921 that “our attention and all our endeavours were aimed at switching from our relations of war with the capitalist countries to relations of peace and trade".  [278•1  It was certainly not due to a lack of consistency in Soviet foreign policy that the first few years were taken up with armed struggle or that Lenin’s advocacy of peaceful coexistence between the socialist and capitalist states fell on deaf ears. Soviet armed resistance resulted from imperialist aggression. It is in the very nature of socialism that a socialist state should pursue a peace-loving policy. The Soviet campaign for peace and peaceful coexistence was, therefore, from the outset an expression of a strategic line based on a sober analysis of objective factors and trends in the world.

p Having failed to destroy the socialist regime by armed force, capitalism had to concede that the two property systems had an equal right to existence. This and the inevitability of agreements between states of opposite systems had an objective basis: the universal economic relations that had obliged the capitalist countries to come to terms with the 279 Soviet Union. It was also in the interests of the young Soviet Republic to promote economic relations with the capitalist world.

p The sympathy and support of workers throughout the capitalist world played a vital part in the success of the peaceful foreign policy of the socialist state while it was in the capitalist encirclement. The policy of safeguarding and peaceful coexistence was-also helped by the dissension that prevailed between individual imperialist states and between various trends within the bourgeois camp—between those who favoured “the big stick" in resolving the issue, and those who favoured peace. Soviet foreign policy had to take all these contradictions into consideration so as to isolate the more reactionary, aggressive, invasion-minded elements among the capitalist authorities.

p A world situation in which capitalist countries work as partners of the socialist state inevitably implies negotiations, compromises and mutual concessions, without which no agreement or peaceful resolution of any outstanding issue is feasible. In defining concessions and compromises for the sake of peace, Lenin succinctly delineated the boundaries which would be wide enough to give socialist foreign policy sufficient room for manoeuvre, but would preclude any surrender over principles.

p While pursuing a consistent policy of peaceful coexistence with the capitalist states, the Soviet Union never felt that it was automatically guaranteed. It was always aware of the danger of peace being broken and of a real threat of an armed clash between socialism and capitalism. This threat emanated not from the incompatibility of the two systems, but from the aggressive anti-Soviet intentions of the imperialists. The Soviet Republic, therefore, had to keep constant watch and be militarily prepared, improving its defences and building up an army that could withstand any imperialist attack.

p The Soviet Union’s long experience in foreign policy has confirmed the power and vitality of the Leninist principle of peaceful coexistence, which bore fruit even at a time when the balance of power clearly favoured the imperialists, when the maintenance of peaceful relations hung on the provisional, sectional and transient interests of some sections of the bourgeoisie or some capitalist states, and when 280 socialism was in no position to determine the course of international relations or prevent the outbreak of war.

p In its formative years, the Soviet Union was much weaker than the advanced capitalist powers and the imperialists enjoyed military supremacy; but the subsequent successful building of socialism cut the ground from under the imperialists. The Second World War demonstrated the strength of the socialist regime, when the U.S.S.R. was strong enough to defeat nazi Germany, the striking force of world imperialism. The war also brought fresh proof of the opportunities to be gained from co-operation between the capitalist and socialist states, as the anti-Hitler coalition convincingly demonstrated.

p The ideas of peaceful coexistence, founded on the experience of the U.S.S.R.’s relations with capitalist states, acquired even greater significance after the war, when socialism was no longer confined to a single country, as socialist revolutions triumphed in Europe and Asia and the socialist community came into existence.

p In the new international climate that developed from the radical shifts in the world alignment and balance of class forces, the correctness and viability of the socialist foreign policy of peaceful coexistence were utterly vindicated.

p The consistent adherence of the Soviet Union and other socialist states to the principle of peaceful coexistence makes quite untenable the imperialist cold war policy, limited local wars and preparation for a new world war against the socialist community.

p As a result of the profound changes that took place in world development in the late 1950s and early 1960s, together with the old factors making peaceful coexistence possible, it has become the one sure way of avoiding a thermonuclear holocaust.

p The Soviet Union is convinced that peaceful coexistence cannot be based merely on the desire, will and concern of one side, the socialist camp. It would be idle to expect the imperialist states, of their own free will, to renounce their anti-socialist policies and attempts to export counterrevolution.

p Peaceful coexistence must rest on definite objective conditions. When Marxists-Leninists speak of objective factors and the twofold nature of the peaceful coexistence process, 281 they base their convictions on the vastly increased potential of the socialist community and its allies for securing lasting peace and compelling the imperialists to accept the principle of peaceful coexistence.

p The immense material resources that socialism now commands to repulse aggression have a big impression on the imperialists. Earlier, a single socialist state pursued the policy of peaceful coexistence and whether or not it was accepted depended on the wishes of the imperialists, on the contest and confusion of the various pressure groups among the bourgeoisie. Times have changed. Even officials in the capitalist world nowadays well appreciate that the peaceful coexistence policy is the only sensible policy for capitalist governments, too.

p In the event of the imperialists’ unleashing a new world war, they would only bring down catastrophe upon themselves: mass destruction of capitalist property and massive fatalities among their populations, including the rulingclasses themselves. Without a doubt, it could only end in the elimination of capitalism as a system. Any realistic consideration of the consequences of thermonuclear war cannot but lead to the conclusion that it is in the interests of all sections of society to avert world war at all cost.

p The economic basis for peaceful coexistence is also being extended. The growing capitalist interest in business links with the socialist states is due both to the growing economic potential of socialism and its consequent trade opportunities, and to the dwindling area of capitalist exploitation and the growing difficulty of finding markets.

p The policy of peaceful coexistence is designed to avert world thermonuclear war, resolve international issues round the conference table, and respect every nation’s right to choose its own social system. It promotes mutual understanding and co-operation between all states. At the same time, the climate of peaceful coexistence is a great help to the liberation struggle and all peoples endeavouring to implement revolutionary change. It also hampers imperialist interference in the affairs of other nations and makes it more difficult for them to export counter-revolution.

p From the outset, the Soviet state has conducted a campaign for disarmament. Though torn by internal strife, the imperialist powers were united in their refusal to disarm. 282 Nonetheless, the Soviet Union has persisted with its disarmament proposals and has gained the sympathy and support of progressives within the capitalist world.

p Bourgeois falsifiers say the Soviet disarmament policy is mere propaganda, and try to prove that the Soviet Government has put forward its proposals being fully aware of their impracticability and is merely seeking to make political capital out of them. Yet, a sound study of the socioeconomic reasons for any increase in belligerence on the part of any imperialist power and in the threat of war has never implied a fatalistic acceptance of the uselessness of fighting to avert war. In the troubled international climate of the inter-war years, when the forces of imperialism surrounded the Soviet Union and enjoyed military and technical superiority, the Soviet Government fought for its disarmament policy with all the means at its disposal.

p The Soviet disarmament proposals, repeatedly made in the inter-war period, were designed to secure specific agreements which could help to reduce the huge stockpiles of armaments, cut back munitions production, and lessen international tension and the ever-present menace of war. In presenting these proposals for discussion at the various international conferences, the Soviet Government was never guided by Utopian hopes of the imperialists becoming lovers of peace, but relied for their implementation on the growing economic and political strength of the U.S.S.R., the anti-war campaign in the capitalist states, and the dissension within the imperialist ranks. Mobilising foreign opinion against the imperialist arms race and war preparations was another salient feature of the peace campaign and fight against the belligerent policy of the big capitalist states.

p The Soviet disarmament campaign is a vivid illustration of socialist foreign policy in action, a new type of policy which expresses the interests of the widest sections of the population in all countries. The young Soviet state, having beaten off the imperialist intervention and broken the iron ring of economic, political and diplomatic blockade, led the struggle to resolve outstanding international issues in the interests of peace and to establish the best conditions for promoting world progress.

p At their first big international conference, in Genoa, the Soviet delegates proposed a general arms reduction and 283 expressed readiness to support any proposals designed to lighten the burden of militarism and prevent the use of means of destruction against the civilian population. But the Soviet peace programme evoked no response from the capitalist delegates at Genoa.

p Soviet participation in the Preparatory Commission for the 1927 Disarmament Conference and in the 1932 International Disarmament Conference revealed to the whole world the purposeful and consistent Soviet effort for disarmament. Soviet foreign policy manifested not only its lofty principles in its approach to vital issues, but also its great flexibility in tackling specific issues. The imperialist delegates at the inter-war conferences, whose prime aim was to cover up their frantic stockpiling of arms with a flood of pacifist declamations, often found themselves in deep water when confronted with the terse and consistent Soviet policy.

p It cannot be said that the Soviet campaign was futile, even if the disarmament talks of that period were fruitless through the fault of the imperialist powers. The important thing is that it helped to expose the aggressors and their abettors. The Western policy of unleashing war was countered by the vigorous efforts of the Soviet Union to prevent war.

p The Soviet Union did all in its power to strengthen peace. It signed non-aggression pacts with virtually all its neighbours and many other countries as well; it concluded conventions on the precise definition of aggression; it conducted negotiations on an “Eastern Pact" and, in 1935, signed the Franco-Soviet and Czechoslovakian-Soviet Mutual Assistance Pacts. These and many other acts prior to the Second World War testified to the Soviet Union’s vigorous policy in international affairs and its eagerness to do all it could to guarantee European security and avert war. It was the Soviet Union’s robust and consistent policy on issues of peace, disarmament and collective security, and its firm stand in exposing the aggressors and their allies, that enhanced its international standing and attracted public sympathy everywhere.

p Since the Second World War, the Soviet initiative in reinforcing peace and resolving the disarmament issue has once again witnessed to the aim of Soviet foreign policy to 284 use the favourable opportunities developing as a result of the changing international balance of power.

p The Soviet proposals for general and complete disarmament were an important milestone in the Soviet drive for disarmament. This peace initiative found broad response among the world public. At the United Nations, the Soviet proposals sparked off renewed efforts to achieve disarmament, with the result that a General Assembly resolution reaffirmed that the problem of general and complete disarmament was the most exigent issue of the time. It called on the governments to do all in their power to achieve a rapid and positive settlement of the problem. The Soviet initiative had, therefore, brought about the first real steps in the direction of halting the arms race and removing the threat of war.

p Furthermore, the Soviet Union fought hard to ban nuclear weapons, threatening mankind with an unprecedented calamity, and to call an immediate halt to nuclear tests, which had already had deleterious effects on human health and menaced the health and lives of future generations. In all its proposals on these issues, the Soviet Government invariably drew attention to the need and real possibility of international agreement in the interests of all nations. The U.S.S.R. proposed that the powers should agree to halt nuclear tests without prior agreement on other aspects of the disarmament issue.

p Because the Soviet Government realised the improbability of immediate conclusion of a test ban treaty, due to the intransigence of the Western powers, it made fresh proposals in 1963 that paved the way for a partial test ban treaty. The ten-day negotiations in Moscow between Soviet, British and American representatives culminated on July 25, 1963, in the initialling of the treaty banning nuclear tests in three environments. Besides the signatures of the three big nuclear powers, the Moscow Treaty, signed on August 5, 1963, contains the signatures of more than a hundred states. This is a great achievement for the policy of peace.

p In the troubled international situation of recent years, exacerbated by the aggressive action of the U.S.A., the Soviet Union has not slackened its efforts to safeguard peace and security. Soviet diplomacy continues to campaign for disarmament and for the settlement of outstanding issues, 285 that would take much of the steam out of international tension and curb the arms race. To attain these aims it would above all be necessary to dismantle all military bases, withdraw all foreign troops from other territories, and conclude an agreement on the total prohibition of nuclear weapons.

p In 1965, the Soviet Government put before the U.N. General Assembly a draft treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. The resolution subsequently adopted rellected the intense concern of all peoples in a vital solution of the problem. The Assembly called on all governments to take every action to have an international treaty signed. The Soviet campaign eventually bore fruit when in 1968 the General Assembly approved, by an overwhelming majority, the Soviet draft treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.

p It was mainly due to the peace-loving policy of the Soviet Union and other socialist states that the Korean war was ended in 1953, the Indochina war in 1954, and that the Caribbean crisis was resolved. The U.S.S.R. played an important part in ending the Indo-Pakistani conflict. Today, the Soviet Union is trying hard to halt the U.S. aggression in Vietnam, to eradicate the consequences of the Israeli aggression against the U.A.R., Syria and Jordan, radically to improve the international situation and to attain a peaceful solution of all outstanding international issues.

p One of the central aims of Soviet foreign policy has always been to strengthen European security. The Soviet Union backed the proposal of the German Democratic Republic that both German states should forego the manufacture, acquisition and use of nuclear weapons and their deployment on their territories, and, further, take measures to cut back the number of troops and armaments in both German states. The Soviet Union has also upheld Poland’s initiative to call a conference of European states to discuss an effective security system for Europe, the proposals to form a nuclear-free zone in Central Europe, to recognise the inviolability of the existing frontiers in Europe, and to respect the sovereignty of every state. The U.S.S.R. has approved and upheld the proposals of Bulgaria, Rumania and other socialist states to bolster European security, particularly in the Balkans.

p The Warsaw Pact member-states are engaged in a concerted campaign to attain European security. Their prime 286 aim, in the interest of peace and security, is to prevent the U.S.-backed militaristic and revanchist rulers oi the Federal Republic of Germany from obtaining access to nuclear weapons and gaining any concessions to their territorial claims. The Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries consider one of the chief conditions for European security to be recognition of the inviolability of the existing frontiers, including those of the German Democratic Republic, Poland and Czechoslovakia. The Warsaw Pact members have more than once declared their determination to rebuff any aggression from imperialism and reaction.

p In complete accord with the interests of all European peoples, the Soviet Union has been trying to make the continent a model of lasting peace, and comprehensive and fruitful co-operation between nations with equal rights.

p The Soviet Union has also invested great faith in the United Nations and its ability to bring a relaxation of international tension. Soviet foreign policy seeks to make the U.N. an effective instrument of peace and security; it has, therefore, used the new balance of forces both in the world and within the United Nations to make this organisation a more effective and all-embracing body. It is the Soviet Government’s aim to involve U.N. in the campaign rapidly to eliminate the international crises that arise out of the aggressive acts of the imperialists. In the immediate post-war years, this activity was largely confined to exposing the aggression from the U.N. rostrum and voting in the Security Council against Western proposals designed to exploit the U.N. name to further imperialist policy. Once the United Nations had accepted a group of socialist countries and a large number of newly independent states, it became increasingly possible to gain U.N. support in countermanding imperialist aggression. The Soviet record in the United Nations is a vital component of the Soviet peace struggle, which is supported by all those in the world who cherish peace.

p In its campaign for peace and a negotiated settlement of outstanding issues, the Soviet Government attaches paramount importance to better relations with the chief capitalist powers, including the U.S.A. Since its first proposal for a non-aggression treaty between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. in early 1956, the Soviet Union has frequently sponsored specific measures encouraging better Soviet-American 287 relations. Such measures as the establishment of a “hot line" between Moscow and Washington, the conclusion of the 1963 Moscow Test Ban Treaty, an agreement banning the use of nuclear weapons in outer space and an agreement on its nonproliferation, the mutual pledges to limit the manufacture of fissionable materials, are all evidence of the headway made by Soviet policy in respect of the U.S.A., designed to improve Soviet-American relations in accordance with the principle of peaceful coexistence. While adhering to the principle of peaceful coexistence, the Soviet Union has strongly condemned the aim of some Americans to limit this principle to Soviet-American relations and simultaneously to perpetrate acts of aggression against other states, to export counter-revolution and exacerbate international tension. The Soviet Union has consistently worked for peaceful coexistence not only in relations between the great powers, but also between big and small states.

p Mutually advantageous political, economic and cultural relations, based on the peaceful coexistence principle, have been developing between the Soviet Union and France since the mid-1960s. The return visits of heads of state in 1966 made a substantial contribution to better Franco-Soviet relations. Similarly, Franco-Soviet economic, scientific, and cultural co-operation has been progressing successfully.

p Despite the refusal of the British Labour Government to renounce its support for U.S. aggression, Soviet-British relations have also made some headway. The Soviet Government has persistently sought to promote these relations on the basis of the principles of peaceful coexistence.

p In recent years, mutually beneficial relations have been developing between the U.S.S.R. and Italy, Japan and other capitalist states. As a result, in spite of the pressure applied from belligerent circles in the U.S.A., their political relations have also shown signs of improvement.

p Soviet foreign policy is particularly concerned with fostering good-neighbour relations with countries bordering on the Soviet Union. Soviet-Finnish relations are a shining model of the embodiment of the peaceful coexistence principle. Favourable conditions exist for promoting better relations with the other Scandinavian countries. Traditional amicable relations prevail between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan. As a result of the 1965 Soviet-Afghan talks, the 288 mutual non-aggression and neutrality treaty, concluded in 1931, was renewed for another ten years.

p The Soviet Union’s relations with its two southern neighbours, Iran and Turkey, have also improved. This is further confirmation of the Lenin-established principle in relations with these nations, and demonstrates that the national interests of Iran and Turkey require the fostering of peaceable good-neighbour relations with the Soviet Union. Consolidation of Soviet-Iranian and Soviet-Turkish relations can and must become the principal guarantee of security in that area and promote mutual economic and cultural development.

p Soviet efforts to enhance international security and strengthen peace are imbued with the determination to uphold the principles of socialist foreign policy and a sense of profound responsibility. That Soviet foreign policy is founded on humane principles and represents the vital interests of all people is amply testified to in its results: the policy is effective, influential and successful.

p Questions bearing on the further strengthening of friendship and cohesion of the countries within the world socialist system are at the centre of the foreign policy activity of the C.P.S.U. and the Soviet state. The 24th Congress of the C.P.S.U. noted the successes in co-ordinating foreignpolicy activity within the framework of the Warsaw Treaty, and stressed the special importance of the socialist countries’ economic integration, which expresses the objective requirements of development in the socialist world.

p The Soviet Union’s stand on its relations with the Chinese People’s Republic is determined by its concern for the interests of world socialism and for strengthening the unity of the anti-imperialist forces. Resolutely rejecting the Peking leaders’ slanderous inventions, the C.P.S.U. stands for normalising relations between the two states and restoring the friendship between the Soviet and the Chinese peoples in accordance with their fundamental interests.

p The 24th Congress of the C.P.S.U. highlighted the great importance of the Soviet policy of active defence of peace and strengthening international security.

The Congress put forward a broad and realistic programme of struggle for peace and international co-operation, and for the freedom and independence of nations.