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p October, 25, 1968

p Dear comrades of the Komsomol! 

p Esteemed veterans of the Party and the Komsomol! 

p Esteemed foreign guests! 

p Dear friends! 

p The Lenin Komsomol has reached the age of 50. This is a great occasion for the Soviet people. All of us, people of different generations, feel young today because our youth began in the ranks of the Komsomol. Half a century is a long span. But our Komsomol does not grow old.

p On behalf of the Central Committee of our Party, on behalf of the Communists of the Soviet Union, allow me to extend heartfelt congratulations to the All-Union Lenin Young Communist League and all Soviet young people on the occasion of this great and joyful anniversary. (Applause.)

p Born of the revolutionary storm and tempered in the crucible of class battles, the Komsomol is the child of the Bolshevik Party and the militant youth of the Land of Soviets. The great Lenin stood at its cradle. The Party has always lovingly reared, educated and tempered the Komsomol, which is its reliable militant reserve.

p Since 1924 the Komsomol bears the name of Lenin. In accepting this beloved name, the members of the Komsomol vowed to live, work and fight in the Leninist way and faithfully to fulfil the behests of the great teacher and leader. Today we have full grounds for saying that the Komsomol is true to this indestructible pledge. All the glorious deeds and all the achievements of the Komsomol, of our young people, have been inspired by Lenin’s teaching.

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p Our Party and the whole Soviet people have highly assessed the fine battle and labour feats of the Komsomol. There are five Orders on its banner. It is with great joy that I wish to inform you that the outstanding services of Soviet young people have received further recognition: on the recommendation of the Central Committee of the Party the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR has decorated the Lenin Komsomol with the Order of the October Revolution on the occasion of its 50th anniversary. (Stormy, prolonged applause. Cheers. Cries of ’"Thank you, Party!" All rise. Prolonged ovation.}

p This decoration is a token of the nation’s recognition of the selfless patriotic deeds of our young people, who are true to Lenin’s behests and devote all their teeming energy, intelligence and talent to the great cause of the revolution, to the defence of the motherland, to the building of communism. This event stirs all of us who began our public activity as members of the Komsomol. I congratulate members of the Komsomol warmly, from the bottom of my heart, on the receipt of this honourable and merited decoration. (Stormy applause.}

p On the occasion of the Komsomol’s anniversary, some of its organisations have also been decorated. To all of them we extend warm congratulations and wishes for new achievements in labour and creative successes for the good of our great motherland. (Applause.}

p Together with the present many-million-strong contingent of Komsomol members, the glorious 50th anniversary is being marked by all generations of the Lenin Young Communist League.

p In this hour of commemoration our first word is about those whose youth was spent in struggle for the victory of the world’s first proletarian revolution, about those who began their road in life in the ranks of Russia’s Young Communist League during the period of bitter fighting against the enemies of the young Soviet Republic. Along with the Komsomol membership card and the revolutionary mandate the young fighters were handed rifles. Young men and women of the young Soviet Republic fought a life-and-death battle against Kolchak and Denikin, Yudenich and Wrangel, against interventionists from fourteen countries.

p The sons of the Lenin Komsomol matured in the struggle against enemies under the banner of the Communist Party. 85 They became steeled, dedicated fighters for the happiness of the people, for socialism.

p We address a word of congratulation on this day of commemoration to the Komsomol members of the 1930s, to those who were in the front ranks of the builders of socialism, to those who helped to fashion the country’s industry.

p In those years the revolutionary mandate of the young proletarian, peasant and graduate of a workers’ faculty was a Komsomol assignment to a new building project. In those years the front was delineated by the targets of the first five-year plans. It was a labour front. The militant watchwords were: Dnieper Hydropower Station, TurkestanSiberian Railway, Magnitogorsk and Komsomolsk-on-Amur. The Komsomol took charge of the most important projects and was to be found where the work was hardest.

p We have not forgotten nor shall we ever forget how young men and women dug foundation ditches with picks and shovels in bitter frost, and evened concrete with their feet.

p Remember, friends, how in the countryside the first Komsomol members ploughed up not only the old boundaries but also old habits, the entire age-old way of village life. It sometimes happened that there were only two or three Komsomol members in a village, but they courageously flung a challenge to the class enemy. Undaunted by kulak bullets, the Komsomol members enlisted the rural youth into the drive for collectivisation.

p It was a stormy time, so much so that, as they say, it took people’s breath away. The Komsomol itself learned and within the bounds of its strength and knowledge taught others. Komsomol members set up illiteracy-abolition circles, opened for millions of illiterate people the door to the riches of knowledge and carried the light of the new life. They made an immense contribution to the genuine cultural revolution that was accomplished in our country.

p The youth of the 1930s has entered the chronicle of the Komsomol as storming the stratosphere, fighting in the ranks of international brigades and developing the taiga backwoods. In those years, side by side with their senior comrades, they created the foundation of socialism. This foundation has been cemented by unparalleled labour heroism and revolutionary enthusiasm.

p Today, on the occasion of the Komsomol’s 50th anniversary we extend congratulations also to the Komsomol 86 members who fought heroically in the Great Patriotic War, to those who courageously rose to socialism’s defence in response to the first call of the motherland, to the call of the Party.

p Like their fathers and mothers during the Civil War, young men and women went to the front by entire Komsomol organisations. The deeds of the young heroes at the different fronts, behind the enemy’s lines and at factories and collective farms shall always remain in our hearts and in the memory of coming generations.

p The young generation that has grown up under Soviet power has proved that it solicitously carries the flame of revolutionary traditions through the years and decades.

p As in the days of Nikolai Ostrovsky, Komsomol steel has been tempered in the fire of battle and in hard, dedicated work. In the stern hour of trial, young men and girls in their ’teens, who had hitherto known neither hunger nor need, displayed endurance, staunchness and unshakable faith in victory.

p Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Oleg Koshevoi, Liza Chaikina, Alexander Matrosov, Nikolai Gastello, Marite Melnikaite. . . . The very mention of these names brings to life a vivid and moving picture of mass heroism, self-sacrifice, spiritual purity and nobility such as the history of previous epochs has never known.

p Such were the Komsomol members of the 1940s who were educated by the Party in the spirit of utter devotion to the ideals of Leninism and the socialist motherland.

p Yes, comrades. Nobody will ever defeat a country where every new generation preserves and multiplies the militant traditions of preceding generations. (Applause.)

p Before the sound of gunfire had subsided the Komsomol began, in response to the Party’s call, the rehabilitation of the war-ravaged economy. Spirited young people went to work at the Zaporozhstal project, in the Donbas and in Stalingrad to return to life everything that had been built by their older brothers and by their fathers and barbarously destroyed by the enemy.

p Within an unprecedentedly short time we healed the grievous wounds inflicted by the war. Fields of green wheat and factory buildings appeared where the land was scorched by the enemy, and towns and villages rose from ruins. This was a great labour exploit.

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p The Komsomol members of our day are 23 million young fighters for communism, young men and women of more than 100 nations and nationalities. This is a generation which has grown up after the Patriotic War.

p Although this is the youngest generation, it has already accomplished many glorious deeds. Evidence of this are the priority Komsomol building projects and the labour achievements of young workers and collective farmers.

p We cannot picture the history of the Komsomol without the epic of Bratsk, Rudny, Norilsk, Sumgait, Rustavi and many other projects. Virgin land was developed by 350,000 young people on assignments from the Komsomol. Thousands of volunteers are helping to build the mammoth Krasnoyarsk Hydropower Station and are working with dedication at the key projects of the five-year plan. The Komsomol members of today, like their older brothers before them, have their own milestones and their own names which are an example for the youth of the country. We have every reason for saying that the Komsomol replacement continues the cause of preceding generations of young builders of communism. (Applause.)

p Comrades, today, on the eve of the 50th anniversary of the Lenin Young Communist League, we look back to the bright image of those young men and women, of those selfless heroes, fighters of the many-million-strong army of the Komsomol, who gave their lives for our common cause.

p The girl in the leather jacket who was cut down by a whiteguard bullet, the lad in a soldier’s tunic closing the firing port of a fascist pillbox with his heart—today they are with us. We remember and speak of them not as fallen but as living. They were young when death wrested them away from the fighting ranks. But being eternally young, they are with us. I propose a minute’s silence in memory of the young fighters and builders of the new society who gave their most precious possession, their lives, for the triumph of Lenin’s immortal ideals. (All rise.)

p Comrades, the tasks of the Komsomol in the building of socialism and in the communist education of the rising generation were outlined by Lenin at the 3rd Congress of the Komsomol in 1920. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin formulated the content and methods of the work of the Youth League, concretely showed what the Komsomol had to do as the 88 assistant of the Communist Party and defined the role and place of young people in social life and in the building of communist society.

p In the hour of trial, when the young Land of Soviets was held in the vise of intervention, famine, mutinies and economic dislocation, it needed Lenin’s gift of brilliant prevision to look into the future and show young people the road to the communist morrow.

p Nearly half a century has passed since Lenin delivered that speech. But every new generation unfailingly turns to it in search for an answer to the problems posed by the new conditions of a changing situation.

p Lenin’s historic speech was and remains an important theoretical document of our Party, a document defining its tasks in the education of young people. In line with Lenin’s behests our Party and its Central Committee have displayed a paternal concern for young people at all stages of the revolutionary struggle and communist construction.

p All of our Party’s counsels to the Komsomol and all its calls to it, to the young generation, were permeated with the Leninist desire to see young people take an active part in communist construction and display their initiative and ardour in all the affairs of the nation.

p For the Komsomol the Party has always been an older friend, a good adviser and mentor, and has always taken close to heart the thoughts, needs and aspirations of the rising generation.

p It is natural for young people to look to the future because the future belongs to them. They follow the Communist Party because the Party leads the working people to the future, to a great aim, which has always attracted and inspired foremost young people, to communism. ( Applause.}

p We are living at a remarkable time, when the building of communist society, the creation of the material and technical basis of communism has been started along a wide front in the country. This has become possible because having built socialism, the Soviet people headed by the Party have created new social relations, powerful productive forces and an advanced science and culture.

p Look at the level achieved by our country today: steel output is reaching 107 million tons, oil output is this year to step past the 300 million ton mark, the output of coal 89 will be nearly 600 million tons and the output of electric power comes to 640,000 million kwh.

p But the Party always looks ahead. The 23rd Congress of the CPSU and our Party’s Programme have set us tasks of a new scale and content. We have to strengthen and develop our social and state organisation, improve socialist democracy, secure a more fuller unravelling of the advantages and creative possibilities inherent in the socialist system and further improve the people’s standard of living.

p We have to build more factories, mills, mines, power stations, new towns and settlements, irrigation systems and electric power transmission lines, millions of new apartments, and thousands of schools and kindergartens. We know how fabulously rich our country is in minerals. But, I would say, it is only now, when the excavator and the bulldozer, and not the pick and the shovel, have become the symbol of new projects, when diamond-tipped drills drive five or six kilometres into the ground, that we can really utilise our natural resources.

p The scope of our work, the daring of our plans and the grandiose scale of what we are doing and have to accomplish may be judged from, say, the following examples. A new oil pipeline stretches for nearly 9,000 kilometres from Tataria to Brest in the west and to Irkutsk in the east. On the agenda now is the building of a gas pipeline from Siberia, where vast reserves of gas have hitherto been inaccessible to man, to the European part of the country. Gas will flow across forests, rivers and mountains to towns and settlements, to factories and homes. Or take the SayanoShushenskoye Hydropower Station, the building of which was started this year. It will be ten times the size of the Dnieper Hydropower Station. Such are the scales of our day.

p In all these great projects our glorious young workers, the heart and soul of the Komsomol, are, as before, on the very front line of communist construction. They are honourably continuing the revolutionary traditions of the older generations of the heroic working class of the Soviet Union (applause) and capably mastering the superb skills of veterans of production. The capable hands of young men and women workers are increasing the motherland’s wealth, creating the foundation for improving the life of the people 90 and translating into life the forward-looking ideas of our scientists and designers.

p To the Komsomol members at factories and mills the Party says: Be the initiators of the new and advanced, bring fresh ideas, resourcefulness and inventiveness into technological processes and production and be intolerant of stereotypes.

p Today we are building more housing than any other country in the world. During the current five-year period more than 60 million people will be given better housing and moved to new homes. Actually, it is a process of renewing the housing accommodation throughout our country. Consider, dear comrades, the social significance of this process. The ramshackle houses inherited from tsarist times and the barrack-type buildings of former years are living their last days. Millions of families are moving into bright modern houses and receiving apartments with electricity, gas and hot water. This means that the life of people is undergoing a fundamental change, that the conditions are improving for recreation, cultured leisure, study and the upbringing of children.

p Of course, comrades, in housing and everyday life we still have difficulties. Not everybody yet lives as he should like. We still have workers’ hostels. For some time we shall have to reconcile ourselves to this. These difficulties, as you know, are steadily diminishing in proportion to the growing scale of construction. Here much depends on our builders.

p As you see, the trade of builder will continue to stand in high esteem. The Party is certain that new contingents of young people will join the ranks of builders. We should like to wish the Komsomol building projects to grow at the most rapid rate and to keep pace with the modern requirements of scientific and technological progress, and that builders belonging to the Komsomol should set the example everywhere. (Applause.) To build fast and well and utilise machinery and material resources with the greatest effect are the demand of the day and what the Komsomol should drive for at building projects.

p May our young people continue to aspire to the high honour of being the first builders and assemblymen and the first residents of towns that have not yet been marked on the map. Our plans and projects cannot fail to stir young hearts who 91 cherish the romance of hard work and the joy of discovery. (Applause.)

p In speaking of romance, comrades, we must mention those vistas that the swift advance of modern science and technology, the achievements of physics and chemistry and the discoveries in biology are opening for keen young minds.

p Gigantic resources of energy, unprecedented even in our nuclear age, will be obtained by people when they have learnt to control the synthesis of the atomic nucleus. Further successes in space exploration will make it possible not only to get a direct knowledge of the Moon and neighbouring planets but find the keys to other riddles of the Universe whose solution will vastly influence the entire progress of science and technology. Knowledge of the laws of genetics will make it possible to control heredity, influence the formation of living organisms, solve many problems of the fight against disease and substantially enlarge mankind’s food resources.

p You may be proud of the fact that in our science there are many Komsomol members or people who have gone through the Komsomol school. Together with the veterans, young scientists are actively helping to resolve the major problems of the scientific and technological revolution and injecting the spirit of innovation and bold quest into scientific work. (Applause.)

p We must act on the principle that our economic plans cannot be successfully fulfilled without the utilisation of the latest discoveries of science and technology in our national economy.

p That is why the Party calls on the Komsomol to promote on a larger scale the movement of young people aimed at mastering modern science and technology and to concern itself more actively with questions of the scientific organisation of labour and production management.

p What immense scope for initiative and admirable innovation in labour is opening for young people in the countryside!

p Addressing young people in 1935, Maxim Gorky said:

p “We have to cultivate all our land as an orchard, drain swamps, bring water to the arid deserts, canalise and deepen rivers, build millions of kilometers of roads and clear our enormous forests. In our country there must be no room for locusts which devour grain, for fever-carrying 92 mosquitoes.. .. This is, of course, still not all. There is still much diverse fascinating work to be done in the building of the first genuinely cultured, socialist state. This work awaits you and demands profound scientific knowledge."  [92•1 

p A great deal has been done, of course, since these words were spoken. Colossal work has been accomplished in irrigating deserts, building canals and roads and draining swamps. Soviet scientists, agronomists and civil airmen have destroyed the locust, which is a terrible scourge. They have gained the upper hand also over a villain like the malarial mosquito. But what attractive work still lies ahead!

p Indeed, comrades, in agriculture, as in industry, we have reached new frontiers. Today we are in a position to allocate more investments for agriculture and provide it with more machines, fertilisers and electric power. We want to raise agriculture to the productivity, labour efficiency and technical equipment level of our industry.

p The Party has set the truly great task of delivering agriculture from the whims of nature, from constant dependence on the climate. A long-term plan of land improvement is being put into effect in our country. Large irrigation systems are under construction at legendary Kakhovka and in the North Caucasus, in Uzbekistan and in the Trans-Volga area. Building has started on the third section of the KaraKum Canal.

p All of us highly value the initiative of the Komsomol in calling on young people to devote themselves to work in the countryside after finishing school, to acquire the profession of agronomist, ameliorator, zootechnician, engineer, or farm-machine operator, and work at the stock-breeding farms or in the fields, in rural schools, hospitals or clubs.

p The militant task before the rural youth is to make the fullest use of every hectare of land, to grow two ears of wheat where only one used to grow and secure a general upsurge of efficiency in grain farming and livestock- breeding. The Komsomol plays a large role also in improving everyday life in the village, in helping the school, in club activities and in sports and other interesting and useful activity attracting young people.

p In our country all work is socially important. It merges 93 into the common effort of the people building communist society. I should like to say a word of appreciation about the Komsomol members who have devoted themselves to work in the sphere of services and everyday life. At first glance their work seems simple and routine. But perhaps no other work exercises such an influence on the day-to-day life of people, and, if you like, on how they feel, on their mood and even on their capacity for work. The Party devotes much attention to promoting trade, public catering and cultural and everyday services in town and countryside. The Komsomol, too, must actively help in this important work.

p In a speech to young people Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin said that in any work, in every sphere of human activity there are indifferent and proficient craftsmen. Everything depends on a person’s attitude to his work, on whether he puts his heart into his work or regards it as an onerous duty and works on the principle of "from here to there".

p Our common task is that the young men and women of the Soviet Union should grow up as proficient craftsmen, as people dedicated to their work, as people for whom work is a need and a joy. (Applause.)

p The Soviet system gives young people wide possibilities for public activity and for participation in affairs of state. One cannot imagine the work of our Soviets, trade unions and state institutions without the active participation of Komsomol members. Some 350,000 young people are deputies to local Soviets and to the Supreme Soviets of the republics. In the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the highest legislative body in the country, there are 182 young people.

p Very considerable work is being accomplished by student Komsomol organisations. The Komsomol helps to give students a Marxist-Leninist outlook and initiates student participation in social labour and public activity.

p Similarly considerable work lies on the shoulders of the Komsomol in schools, particularly in the leadership of the Young Pioneer organisation. We are well aware that this is not easy work. It requires warmth, industry and, as any other work with children, patience, perseverance and the ability to draw children into useful activity. Children remember their leaders all their lives. The Komsomol meritoriously fulfils this important and honourable assignment from the Party. (Applause.)

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p Comrades, you all know what splendid possibilities have been created in our country for cultural growth and creative activity. In no other country are there so many theatres, palaces of culture, cinemas, clubs, libraries and museums. Everything created in this sphere by the Soviet people is accessible to the youth. And this to say nothing of the fact that we have youth theatres and theatres for children, Young Pioneer palaces and houses, art studios for juveniles, publishing houses for young people and children, and so forth. This concern of the Party and the Soviet Government for the cultural development of the rising generation is yielding fruit. Look, for instance, at the scale that has been achieved by amateur art activity in our country and at how the proficiency of its participants is growing. Or take our people’s theatres, creative associations at factory and rural clubs, art studios and quiz clubs. Their activities not only bring aesthetic pleasure to millions of people throughout the country but bring out, foster and nurture young talents that can enrich our art. There are cases, of course, of young authors and performers showing an erroneous taste. But it is precisely the job of the creative unions and the Komsomol to note this opportunely and see to it that the aesthetic training of young people is conducted on a high ideological and artistic level, that it develops healthy tastes, is joyful and optimistic and inspires the work and life of young people. (Applause.)

p We should like to see our young people not only erudite and spiritually beautiful but also healthy, tempered and physically strong. These days we are following the Olympic Games in Mexico and rooting for our team. Not everything has turned out as our athletes had hoped. The competition has been stiff, indeed, and we welcome the victors who are returning home with Olympic medals. Efforts must be continued to raise the international class of our sports. But the main thing is the mass character of the sports movement, the development of physical culture which embraces all young people, the steeling of the willpower of the youth and the physical training of young men and women for labour and defence. (Applause.)

p Comrades, the Communist Party and the whole people of the Soviet Union regard the building of communism in our country and the strengthening of the might and defence capability of our motherland, the mainstay of socialism, 95 peace and the freedom of all peoples, as the major component of their internationalist duty.

p We have never divorced our tasks and affairs from the common cause of liberating the working people of all countries, from the cause of socialism and world peace. It may be said that internationalism is in the blood of all of us. (Applause.) It has been nurtured by several generations of Soviet people and each epoch has subjected it to a new test and set it new tasks.

p The Soviet people are currently rendering massive, allsided assistance to the patriots of Vietnam in their heroic struggle against imperialist aggression. The active support of the just liberation struggle of the Arab countries, the diverse forms of assistance to the peoples of the youngstates that have shaken off colonial oppression and taken the road of anti-imperialist struggle, the road of progressive development, and the broad, all-embracing international links of the Soviet people, including the Komsomol, are manifestations of the Soviet people’s internationalism under present-day conditions. Of extreme importance in this respect are the Soviet people’s friendship and solidarity with the peoples of fraternal socialist countries, the steady expansion and deepening of all forms of contacts, links and fruitful co-operation with them, and a profound sense of joint responsibility for our common great cause, the cause of socialism and communism. (Applause.)

p The Komsomol is doing much to educate the young people of our country in the spirit of the Leninist Party’s internationalist traditions. In a million ways our Komsomol youth reaffirms its solidarity with its class brothers, with the working people of all countries. Honour and glory to the Soviet youth, which bears aloft the banner of class solidarity, the banner of proletarian, socialist internationalism! (Prolonged applause.)

p Comrades, life continually reaffirms the correctness of Lenin’s words that a revolution is worth something only if it is capable of defending itself. The defence of our socialist achievements, the safeguarding of the peaceful labour of Soviet people has always been regarded by our Party as its sacred duty to the people of the Soviet Union and the working people of all countries. In this respect, too, the Komsomol has been and remains the Party’s true and active assistant. (Applause.) The military-patriotic education of 96 young people has always been one of the most striking pages of the Komsomol’s record. From the very first years of its existence the Komsomol has been acting as the patron of the Navy and since 1931 of the Air Force, too. It may be stated with confidence that among the thousands upon thousands of heroes who won glory for our country in the battles against the nazi invaders during the Great Patriotic War there are many who learned to handle a machine gun, glider-plane, parachute, airplane or motor launch in the circles, clubs and schools organised with the assistance of the Komsomol. (Applause.)

p To this day military-patriotic training remains one of the major tasks in the moulding of the rising generation. As many other matters inherited from past decades, this task has its own specifics today. Present-day military equipment is no longer the canvas Farmans of the 1920s nor even the “hawks” and “ducks” of the Patriotic War. Today the defenders of the Soviet motherland must be able to handle intercontinental missiles, supersonic aircraft, nuclearpowered submarines and many other sophisticated weapons. Today there is a need not simply for courageous, welltrained, physically strong lads with a sure eye and a firm hand, but for engineers and mathematicians conversant with the mysteries of electronics and cybernetics. Thus, the tasks in this field, too, have become more complicated, more responsible and of a higher level. But the Komsomol’s drive and enthusiasm, the mettle of youth, courage and valour are needed today as during the Civil War and the years of the first five-year plans and during the flaming years of the Great Patriotic War. In this sphere, too, the field before the Komsomol is indeed of tremendous state, nationwide importance.

p One of the principal sources of the Komsomol’s strength and of the power of its influence over young people is that it helps the Party to bring to the broad mass of young citizens of our country the great truth of the Marxist-Leninist teaching. The Komsomol helps the Party to give young men and women a scientific understanding of history, the experience of the struggle of preceding generations and an understanding of the purport and tasks of our present work and of our struggle with class enemies; it helps young people to see the clear and distinct prospects of our further advance towards communism.

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p I should like to re-emphasise that when the Party speaks of the political education of young people, of the mastering of Marxist-Leninist theory, it has in mind not the mechanical conning of various tenets or books, but the mastering of the very essence of the Marxist-Leninist teaching. This means that our young citizens must not only have a good knowledge of the basic propositions of the Marxist-Leninist theory but learn to find in that theory, in the works of the classics of Marxism-Leninism, in the Party documents the foundation, the key, the most correct method of solving the problems which our present life puts on the agenda. Consequently, it is a matter of shaping a really deep-rooted Marxist conviction and a precise class approach to all the phenomena of social life, of learning to apply the great wealth of the theory of Marxism-Leninism creatively. (Applause.}

p We are living in an epoch witnessing an acute class struggle on the world scene. The imperialist states have started a fierce ideological war against the socialist countries in an effort to activate subversion in the socialist camp, drive a wedge between individual socialist countries and undermine the unity of the international communist movement.

p In this struggle our class adversaries are doing their utmost to influence the minds of young people in the socialist countries. They wear the mask of "friends of young people" in their striving to draw into their net politically unstable and inexperienced young people, dull their class, revolutionary vigilance with spurious bourgeois-liberal arguments, stir up nationalistic sentiments and find renegades who look for an easy life.

p The Central Committee of our Party has drawn the attention of Communists and all Soviet people to the insidious tactics used by imperialism against socialist countries. It was specially underscored that the answer to the subversive activity of imperialist propaganda must be an uncompromising struggle against enemy ideology no matter what form it assumes. The Central Committee of the CPSU has called for the utmost strengthening of the communist conviction, patriotism and internationalism of Soviet people, of their ideological staunchness and ability to counter all forms of bourgeois influence. (Applause.)

p The course of world developments over the past months 98 has quite convincingly shown how well-founded and opportune it had been to set these tasks.

p Dear young friends, our Party is quite certain that in the ideological struggle that has started between the two worlds, as in all other matters, the members of the Komsomol will always be faithful assistants of the Communists. (Applause.) In this struggle our people must be ideologically staunch and firm in their convictions. Our ideological weapon, which is invincible because it is the weapon of truth, must be always sharp and ready.

p The imperialists will never succeed in shattering our moral and political unity. Bourgeois ideologists will never succeed in getting our people to accept the morals of their society where private ownership is the principal criterion of all values and where brutal laws and spiritual and moral barrenness reign. Imperialism has nothing to offer in rivalry to the great strength of the lofty ideas and grandiose aims that inspire Soviet people and our youth to perform great things in labour and in struggle. (Stormy applause.)

p Our strength lies in the fact that the future belongs to socialism and communism. Our strength lies in the fact that we serve lofty humane aims, in the fact that everything we do is devoted to the service of the people, to the struggle for their happiness. Our strength lies in the fact that we are working to translate the brightest ideals of mankind into reality. For the Komsomol no task is more important and more honourable than to bring up the rising generation of its country as real Communists, as worthy continuers of the cause of the great Lenin. (Stormy, prolonged applause.)

p Permit me to express the confidence that our Komsomol will continue fulfilling these responsible tasks as proficiently and with the same zeal and energy as it has done throughout its history—from the flaming years of the Civil War to our days, which are illumined by the light of the great plan of communist construction. (Stormy applause.)

p Dear friends, our country, our great people are building communism. You, the present Komsomol of the Soviet Union, face the prospect of entering the bright edifice of communism and establishing between people new relations which the finest minds of mankind had dreamed of for thousands of years and for whose sake many generations of 99 revolutionaries had sacrificed their lives. But to fulfil this mission worthily it is necessary to prepare well for it and learn communism.

p What does this mean under present-day conditions?

p To learn communism means always to strive to be an active participant in the building of communism and that your labour—the source of satisfaction and of the joy of life for yourself—should fuse with the labour of your comrades for the common good. This means constantly to pursue the aim of acquiring greater skill in one’s profession and assimilating the latest scientific and technical knowledge. This means constantly to look for new and more effective ways in production.

p To learn communism means tirelessly to study the theory of Marxism-Leninism, to acquire a clear understanding of the great historic cause for which our Party and our people are working and become ideologically convinced that this cause is right. This means constantly to sharpen one’s class consciousness, to train oneself on the revolutionary traditions of the Communist Party and the working class in a spirit of an uncompromising attitude towards class enemies and their ideology. This means learning to recognise the class enemy no matter what mask he wears.

p To learn communism means to take an active part in public affairs, to become used to managing public affairs and always and in everything to uphold the interests of our society, of our people, of our state. (Applause.)

p To learn communism means to consolidate the norms of communist morality by word and deed, by personal example. This means constantly to raise one’s cultural level, to widen one’s outlook and steadily enrich one’s mind with more knowledge from the treasure-store of human culture.

To learn communism means to train oneself in a spirit of devoted Soviet patriotism. This means to do one’s utmost to help promote our great motherland’s might and prosperity. This means to safeguard the moral and political unity of our society as the apple of one’s eye, foster friendship among the peoples of our country and to be intolerant of all manifestations of nationalism. This means to be always ready to give all one’s strength and, if necessary, one’s life in defence of one’s socialist motherland, for the happiness of one’s people, for the cause of communism. (Prolonged applause.)

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p To learn communism means to train oneself in the spirit of proletarian, socialist internationalism, in the spirit of fraternal friendship with the peoples of socialist countries and a militant alliance with all fighters for the peace and freedom of nations, in the spirit of class solidarity with the working people of the whole world. (Applause.)

p These are the tasks facing the present generation of Soviet young people, the many-million-strong army of young fighters for communism.

p To carry out all these tasks honourably and to be equal to the demands of the times, our young people must be not only conscientious, educated and cultured but they must strengthen the unity of their ranks, their organisation. This is natural. No army, however well it is armed, will win if it is not welded together by unity of will, organisation and discipline. Such unity of will and such cohesion of our young people are ensured by the Ail-Union Lenin Young Communist League, the true helper of the Party of Lenin. (Stormy, prolonged applause.)

p What you have aptly named the All-Union Komsomol Rally has taken place throughout our country in honour of the Komsomol’s 50th anniversary. At factories, collective and state farms, educational institutions and military units young men and women summed up the results of the jubilee emulation movement, reported on their achievements, spoke of how the Komsomol was preparing to commemorate the gala centenary of the birth of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and expressed their gratitude to the Party for its concern for young people.

p This is just. Young people and the Komsomol have what to be grateful for to the Party. But today, on the day of your jubilee, it would be appropriate for us, people of the older generation, to pay tribute to the Komsomol on behalf of the over 13 million Communists of our country for the love which young people show for the Soviet motherland and the Leninist Party, for the tremendous contribution which the Komsomol is making towards the building of communism. (Stormy, prolonged applause.)

The Komsomol is an admirable political school. It has given much to all of us. The school of the Komsomol has produced many active fighters for the cause of communism, many nationally famous workers in industry and agriculture, many prominent Party leaders and statesmen, many 101 outstanding scientists, designers and soldiers, and leading figures in literature and art. Today, as our Komsomol marks its 50th anniversary, we all say to it with emotion in our hearts: Thank you, glorious banner of our militant youth. Thank you, League of Young Leninists with your eternally teeming revolutionary enthusiasm, spirit of innovation and selfless energy. (Stormy, prolonged applause. All rise. Cries of "Glory to the Party!”) Continue to be such as you have been these 50 years. Lead the young people of the Land of Soviets in heroic endeavour under the banner of the Party of Lenin for the sake of communism, for the sake of the happy future of all mankind. (Stormy, prolonged applause.)