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p Professor Monsen has given the incisive label "export ideology" to the ideas and theories that are being thought up specially for US foreign political propaganda.  [119•****  This, in the final analysis, is the sum total of the ideological facade that modern imperialism is showing to the masses. Although there has been plenty of hypocrisy in bourgeois society’s spiritual life before, the gap between the real ideology of the ruling class, between its real symbol of faith, and the pseudo-ideology which is being offered to the man in the street as official doctrine has never been so great as today.

p The interests of the monopolies lie in intensifying exploitation and political oppression, curtailing democracy and 120 crushing all resistance to their reactionary and aggressive political plans. Naturally, these interests are mirrored in definite ideas of the ruling class: its views on human nature, which, as we have already noted, are not the only confirmation of our contention. The whole system of imperialism’s political ideas is directed at justifying its right to rule, widening the channel for the monopoly-governed state’s interference in all spheres of life and enabling it to manipulate the masses and misinform public opinion.

p But these ideas, in which in one way or another the monopoly bourgeoisie appears as a class "for itself”, prove to be unsuitable when, in appealing to public opinion, it tries to substantiate its right to leadership. In this respect there have been radical changes linked not only with the fact that the interests of the bourgeoisie have still further diverged from those of the other classes and social strata of capitalist society, but also with the fact that stronger ideological positions have been won by its principal adversary—the working class and world socialism, whose influence on all mankind, even though sometimes indirect, has increased.

p This does not signify that in bourgeois society the majority has already been won to the ideals of Marxism-Leninism. In the capitalist countries this problem is still far from having been resolved. But it does mean that a certain system of ideas and ideals linked with the philosophy of socialism has sunk deep roots, is winning the masses and helping them to see their true interests more and more clearly. Under the impact of these ideals the masses are beginning to feel as unnatural the state of affairs where all the economic power is in the hands of a few monopolies. They are moving towards an understanding of the truth that foreign policy, notably the question of war and peace, is not the “sacred” prerogative of the ruling class. The respect that has been cultivated through the ages for private property and state power is steadily waning. To a very large extent this is due to communist ideology, the influence of the socialist countries and the force of their example.

p These irreversible changes in the public mind are making the ideas of the imperialist bourgeoisie, in which it seeks “self-expression”, an unsuitable weapon in the battle for people’s minds, in the struggle for the masses. Hence the 121 efforts to create an "export ideology" and hence the peculiar situation in which in the world-wide war of ideas imperialism is compelled to act under banners and slogans stolen from its class adversaries or from its bourgeois-democratic forerunners.

p Precisely this is one of the foundations of the modern imperialist bourgeoisie’s strategy in the ideological struggle.

p Of course, when we analyse the intricate ideological processes going on in capitalist society today we must be careful not to simplify the picture. In particular, although they are not Marxist-Leninist, the more or less democratic ideas and theories current in bourgeois countries should not be regarded as demagogy, deceit or subterfuge. When we speak of the ideology of the modern bourgeoisie we mean the ideology of imperialism, of the monopoly upper crust of the capitalist class and not the entire range of ideas that determine the motley spiritual life of capitalist society.

p Although socialist ideology is winning firmer positions among the working people of the capitalist countries it should be borne in mind that the mastering of socialist ideas is a long and sometimes contradictory process, in the course of which bourgeois views and prejudices are surmounted. Quite often this process goes through diverse intermediate stages, during which socialist and bourgeois ideas rub shoulders not in "peaceful coexistence" but in sharp conflict even in the minds of individuals.

p Under state-monopoly capitalism contradictions break out and deepen between the ruling monopoly elite and not only the working class but also other classes and social substrata, including the bulk of the intelligentsia, the urban petty bourgeoisie and so on. From the standpoint of their objective interests most of these classes and substrata become allies of the working class. But their subjective perception of these interests very frequently lags behind, giving rise to attempts to substantiate their own special position “outside” the principal social forces locked in struggle. This finds expression also in their ideology, which while being non-socialist, in many ways purely bourgeois, is opposed to the reactionary ideas of the monopoly bourgeoisie.

p Also expressed in the spiritual life of bourgeois society is the fact that under the impact of socialism’s achievements in the peaceful competition with capitalism and of the 122 proletariat’s class struggle the imperialist bourgeoisie is more and more frequently compelled to manoeuvre and make concessions. We do not mean that imperialism actually accepts various socialist ideas or agrees to an ideological compromise with its class adversary. This can never happen. But the political tactics of individual concessions and the efforts to heal the most obvious ulcers of the capitalist system are clearly mirrored in some ideas.

p When the ruling class is forced by the class struggle of the working people to effect individual reforms it finds it difficult to preserve unchanged its official ideological doctrine. This doctrine has to be accommodated to the tactics of reform. The same may be said of the concessions in foreign policy and many other areas. Naturally, the tactics of concessions and their ideological reflection are a bone of contention among the monopoly bourgeoisie itself. It is split into groups, each of which has its own ideas. In this sense the ideological struggle rages within the ruling class as well, and is the continuation of the political struggle (including between the more moderate circles and the diehard reactionaries) in which questions of tactics, concrete policies and so on are decided.

p All this must be borne in mind when we analyse the ideology and ideological strategy of modern imperialism so that we do not lapse into sectarianism and do not artificially increase the number of our enemies, and so that we can look for ways of broadening the anti-imperialist coalition. But this does not change the basic fact that the official ideological doctrine of the ruling bourgeoisie divides into an ideology for "home consumption" and an ideology for “export”. This division can be seen very clearly when we analyse imperialism’s ideological efforts in areas where its ideas come directly into collision with the ideas of socialism, with the philosophy of communism, namely, in foreign political propaganda. This is vividly shown by the fact that today imperialism is fighting for the minds of men under stolen banners.

p Among them is not only the banner of peace. In their foreign policy the imperialists have long ago been concealing their true objectives and intentions and giving themselves out for champions of peace. They assert that the threat of war emanates from the socialist countries. (Efforts in this 123 direction have been steadily mounting.) Today imperialism makes wide use of stolen slogans and ideals in its ideological campaign, its entire propaganda.

p It is symptomatic that unlike socialism it is not even attempting to act under its own name, the name of capitalism (to say nothing of imperialism, although in bygone days this was not regarded as a dirty word in bourgeois society). Instead, it is using terms such as "free world" and "Western democracies”. Freedom, democracy, rights of the individual and so on are slogans borrowed from the revolutionary bourgeoisie of the 18th-19th centuries. Indeed, these slogans figured on its banners and despite the class narrowness of the bourgeoisie’s contribution in bringing these ideals to life they had a profound historical significance. Today, as used by the monopoly bourgeoisie, they have lost that significance. In the epoch of imperialism the democratic heritage of the fathers of bourgeois society has been dissipated by their grandsons and great-grandsons at the fanatic fascist gatherings, in the Oswieciin and Mauthausen death camps, at the disgraceful trials staged by the reactionaries in the USA, in the secret police offices, and on the battlefields of colonial wars.

p The difficulties confronting imperialist propaganda in this connection are evident to many bourgeois theorists. The American sociologist Daniel Lerner writes: "For psychological strategy a difficulty fraught with grave consequences lay in finding a suitable symbol that would give the coalition a uniform identification. Many designations—’democracy’, ’Atlantic community’, ’Western world’, ’ nonCommunist world’, ’free world’—have been used for that coalition during the past ten years. All these designations came into conflict with the inner psychopolitical diversity, to say nothing of the distinctions in the coalition."  [123•* 

p Lerner sees the untenability of the term "Atlantic community" for the coalition that includes Turkey, Pakistan, Japan, Thailand and Australia. The Asians and Africans, he says, immediately associate the term "Western world" with colonialism. The designation "non-Communist world" is inacceptable to those who are firmly determined to remain unaligned. But the most essential thing, Lerner points out, 124 is that even the most attractive of these terms—“democracy” and "free world"—are worthless for they are used to designate a coalition that includes Franco Spain and many brutal dictatorships in Asia and Latin America.  [124•* 

p No, it is not the imperialist bourgeoisie but the revolutionary working class that has become the true exponent of the ideals of freedom and democracy. The reason for this is not only that in this sphere it is the legitimate heir of all the finest achievements of the bourgeois-democratic revolutions of the past. But still more important is the fact that to the working class has fallen the historic mission of surmounting the formal character and narrowness of bourgeois democracy and of enriching the ideals of freedom and democracy with a new and deeper content. That is why imperialism, which is conscious of the attraction of these ideals, is reaching out for the slogans of freedom and democracy in an attempt to appropriate them.

p Imperialist propaganda is manipulating with the slogans of freedom and democracy for one more reason: it seeks to give a new connotation to the principal conflict in the world—the clash between the two social systems—to portray it as a struggle between Western “freedom” and "communist totalitarianism”. Hence its misrepresentation of the substance of the social system in the capitalist countries with the aid of countless variants of "people’s" and “democratic” capitalism, "share democracy" and so forth. But a closer study of these variants will make it clear that here too most of the slogans and ideals are borrowed.

p The aim of all these concepts and theories is to prove the “disappearance” chiefly of those features of the social relationships inherent in capitalism which are being surmounted by socialism, namely, the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a tiny minority of the population, anarchy of production, parasitical appropriation, the glaring injustice in the distribution of social wealth, the people’s lack of confidence in their future, and egoistic individualism. If one stops to think one will see what lies behind the arguments about "share democracy”, the "levelling of wealth”, which is supposedly achieved by special forms of taxation, and " welfare society”. The ideologists of imperialism, who had openly 125 championed the right of "the most adapted" to a privileged position in society are now trying to appropriate a specific communist ideal like the building of a classless society. They are talking about “deproletarianisation”, which they say is predicated by the growth of a "middle class" and have put forward deceptive patterns of "social stratification" in which classes disappear and only purely professional or “functional” distinctions remain.

p The stolen slogans strategy has become widespread since the mid-1950s. Within its framework attempts have been made to appropriate even the slogans of revolution. The purport of this operation was laid bare by John J. McCloy, a prominent figure in US political and military circles. In a foreword to the book Russia and America, published in 1956, he wrote: "We commonly think of the Soviet Union as the revolutionary force in the world today. In doing so we run the risk of allowing the Soviets to pre-empt the role of the symbol and inspiration for constructive change in the conditions of hundreds of millions of people throughout the world.” Fearing this prospect, he says that "we fail to remind others that less than two centuries ago the American people helped to ignite a great revolution which is still sweeping over the earth”, and that the Communists should be labelled “counter-revolutionaries” who had perverted the aims of democracy.  [125•* 

p In the 1960s this propaganda line was used more and more frequently even in formulating the official ideological doctrine of the USA. The highest-ranking officials, beginning with the US President, missed no opportunity to speak of the USA’s revolutionary past and to claim that the USA was again called on to become the "crucible of revolutionary ideas".

p Influential circles in the USA were aware, of course, that the talk about “revolution” might evoke some misunderstanding and confusion among "loyal citizens" brought up in a spirit of hatred of that word, to say nothing of "pillars of society" of the Goldwater and Wallace type. Hence the efforts to pacify this section of “society” and show it that, properly speaking, no upheaval of the foundations was intended. This 126 mission was evidently undertaken as early as 1961 by the journal Foreign Affairs, which devoted an article to this theme, "The Age of Revolution”, written by a certain Henry M. Wriston. "The first necessity,” this article says, "is to rid ourselves of nervousness when ’revolution’ is mentioned.... The slightest acquaintance with history makes it clear that revolutions are as old as recorded history—and as current as today’s news."  [126•*  This was backed up with long-winded arguments about the USA’s revolutionary past and with quotations from the Declaration of Independence and from the Constitution of "even a state we regard as conservative, New Hampshire".  [126•** 

p But none of these subterfuges can help the US ruling circles to hide the fact that they are the mainstay of counterrevolution. Reminders of the "revolutionary past" cannot wash away their notoriety as the stranglers of modern revolutions, as the adversaries of the "constructive changes" mentioned by McCloy. These are not the reminders by which the peoples will judge the USA’s attitude to revolution.

p For them the important thing is not whether the USA has had its “own” revolution (the American bourgeois democracy of the 18th century has as much in common with modern US monopoly capitalism as Thomas Paine has with Barry Goldwater, or Thomas Jefferson with George Wallace) but the attitude of that country’s ruling class to modern revolutions. To this history gives us the most eloquent answer. The USA was the last country to recognise the Soviet Union, which was created by the greatest of modern revolutions. The same thing has happened with regard to Washington’s recognition of the actual changes that sprang from the revolutions accomplished by the people in a number of countries after the Second World War. It is not, however, a matter solely of diplomatic recognition. US imperialism was active in the armed intervention in Soviet Russia. It inspired subversion against all the socialist revolutions without exception, and to this day its political, economic and ideological line is 127 hostile to them. US imperialism tried to crush the Cuban revolution by military force. It organised the shameful counter-revolutionary war in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

p Similarly indicative is the attitude of US imperialism to the national liberation revolutions. It is openly seeking to throttle these revolutions in Latin America, Southeast Asia and other parts of the world. In other areas it operates more subtly, especially with regard to revolutions against the rule of its imperialist rivals. The very fact that for years it has supported political figures like Chiang Kai-shek, Ngo Dinh Diem, Syngman Rhee and Batista, and other Asian and Latin American dictators speaks for itself.

p This is all quite natural because US imperialism’s counterrevolutionary stand springs not simply from somebody’s evil intentions or mistakes but from the objective nature of the modern revolutions. These are socialist and anti-imperialist revolutions towards which, on account of its social nature and political interests, the ruling class of the largest and most powerful imperialist country can show nothing but the most savage hatred.

p It is quite another matter that this line of action adopted by US_ftimperialism as a result of the role of world policeman that it had assumed after the Second World War, a line that has time and again led to armed intervention and bloody wars with the USA’s direct participation, is today becoming increasingly the target of bitter criticism not only from world opinion but also from opinion in the USA itself. Under pressure of this criticism and of the objective realities of the modern world, misgivings over this policy are today beginning to be voiced also by some sections of the US ruling circles. To some extent this is influencing government policy and giving rise to steps that in fact signify a certain recognition of these realities.

p The untenability of the attempts of the US imperialists to pose as “revolutionaries” is so obvious that they have evoked many sceptical comments in the West as well.

p Professor Bernard Lavergne of France, for instance, writes: "In the same way as at the close of the 18th and throughout the 19th century the French revolution was the overshadowing event in the political and economic spheres, the Soviet revolution of 1917 has been and remains, whether one likes 128 it or not, the main centre of attraction for human societies throughout the 20th century."  [128•* 

p Similar comments on the subterfuges of US propaganda have been made also by some uncompromisingly conservative bourgeois scholars. One of them is the English historian Arnold T. Toynbee, who in 1962 published a work entitled America and the World Revolution. Toynbee’s political sympathies are quite obvious. He regards revolution as an abstract category and treats as such all the major social upheavals beginning from the 13th century. But there is no doubt in his mind that fundamental changes have taken place in our century in the alignment of revolutionary and counterrevolutionary forces, and he assesses these changes correctly.

p In spite of his wholehearted sympathy for the USA (he speaks of it in his foreword), he comes to the conclusion that "America is today the leader of the world-wide anti- revolutionary movement in defence of vested interests".  [128•**  "I am maintaining,” Toynbee continues, "that, since 1917, America has reversed her role in the world. She has become the arch-conservative power instead of the arch- revolutionary one. Stranger still, she has made a present of her glorious discarded role to the country which was the arch- conservative power in the nineteenth century, the country which, since 1946, has been regarded by America as being America’s Enemy Number One. America has presented her historic revolutionary role to Russia."  [128•***  Nothing can stop the revolution, "not even the American hands, that first set it rolling".  [128•**** 

This criticism of even a well-wisher of the USA as Toynbee is evidence that with its talk about revolution US propaganda is treading on thin ice. But it is not because the situation is favourable to it that Washington has decided to fight the ideological war with stolen banners. This is further proof of imperialism’s ideological and moral impoverishment, which compelled it to borrow ideological clothes. No borrowed garment has ever fitted.

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p Thus, in the present world-wide war of ideas the forces of socialism, peace and progress face an adversary who is wearing a mask and tries to use an ideological weapon that is alien to him. Naturally, this makes the ideological struggle more complicated and creates the danger that some sections of world opinion will be muddled and deceived by imperialist propaganda. But a closer look will show that this contains the seeds of imperialism’s utter defeat. The ideals of peace, of a just social system, of freedom and democracy and of the revolutionary changes propounded by socialism are winning people’s minds, while imperialism has nothing it can offer as a substitute. That is why it has been forced to shift the weight of its ideological struggle to the argument: Which of the two systems champions and represents these ideals?

The fact that imperialism has had to retreat to this area is a signal triumph of the anti-imperialist forces and it cannot help but have political repercussions. It is not only that this feature of imperialism’s ideological propaganda makes the imperialists more vulnerable and in some measure fetters the monopolies in both internal and external policy. Equally important is that the outcome of the war of ideas is being increasingly decided by the competition between the two systems, a competition in which the determining role is played not so much by words, by the skill of propagandists, as by deeds, by tangible achievements, by the contribution made towards the implementation of ideals that have won the minds of mankind. This means that the socialist countries have a greater possibility of influencing the course of world events through their practical achievements in the building of the new society and through their policies.