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a FS ap Le ( ' woe Re : . eee eo S =) THE TECHNIQUES OF SOVIET PROPAGANDA 35 It is clear that the rulers of the Kremlin hate the democratic form of socialism as much as capitalism. Only in the Communist world is found the combination of political absolutism and economic bureau- cratism which makes possible the exploitation and oppression of people with such unequaled harshness. Communism has a single ambition: to perpetuate its totalitarian state apparatus, and to serve this ambition only one expedient, extending the domination of that apparatus to the entire world. For it cannot tolerate on its flank the resence of a free society whose way of life exposes the Soviet web of es, and fascinates its fettered subjects. It is because the West naerconifies fraodom that the USSR, must erucsh it, * The conflict is then between freedom and dictatorship; between 6 humanistic open society and a despotic closed tribe. This is why minds are at stake more than territories. This is why it concerns every man, in every corner of the globe. If the term “bloc” is to mean the territory of threatened nations, it must be broadened to include the whole free world, and not limited to the United States. Of this whole, the most ardently coveted today is Europe and Asia, not America. If the United States is the fortress facing communism today, Eurasia is the prey. Washington provides a shield, but the primary objective of Soviet aggression is Paris, London, and New Airy FALLACY NO. 2: THE SOVIETS BRISTLE BECAUSE THEY ARE AFRAID The idea that the U.S.S.R. is bristling with missiles and surrounded by buffer states because they fear a Western attack is a monumental absurdity of pro-Soviet propaganda over which the West often stumbles. The notion is appealing to thuse who strive for the prestige of the “ivory tower” attitude, and stems from a lingering resentment created by the anti-Bolshevik intervention of 1919-20. It is of con- siderable service to the Soviets, by completely inverting the respon- sibilities: the pitiable role of the besieged is assigned to the Soviet aggressors, while the assaulted West js objiged to prove its innocence. The notion that the Soviets act aggressively through fear will not bear examination. No free world government has the slightest in- tention of assailing the U.S.S.R., and striking proof was furnished b its voluntary and continuing disarmament from 1945 to 1951, althoug eonfronted by an cverarmed Russia throughout the entire period. Although the Western powers rearmed after the Communist aggres- sion in Korea, this was purely a defensive measure. They began to rearm West Germany only when faced with the massive rearmament of East Germany. ; _ It is preposterous to imagine that the always well-informed rulers in Moscow do not recognize so obvious a truth. They musi be completely aware that no Western power wants to wage war against them. They pretend the contrary only to substantiate the myth of “capitalist encirclement,” a key propaganda issue supplying a plausi- ple pretext to justify their dictatorship. It is the old ruse used by Hitler, who was a paor lamb worried by the big, bud wolves of Prague and Warsaw; the threadbare but apparently still effective pretext of the tyrant who bults the doors, pretending the Devil is lurking outside, when he is the only devil and bolts the doors only to better Sominate inside. The dictators of Moscow, having no reason to fear, are not