Gorby's face

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SOCIALIST ACTION JULY 1991 7 taged parts of the Russian republic, as well as the allotment of 20 percent of new housing for the underprivileged. as unlikely to be able to get the workers who vote for them to accept sacrifices for the sake of the market, which in fact local soviet to change the city's name was a reflection of the liberal opposition majority's inability to bring about any real improvements in the living conditions of In the last months, in its coverage of events in the Soviet Union the Western press has concentrated on extolling the merits of Gorbachev and considering the arguments for giving him vast amounts of aid to sweeten his capitalist restorationist reforms.

The fact that Moscow is continuing repression and threats against the national democratic movements has become, at best, a second-rate issue. Although the attempted Unionist coup d'état in Vilnius in January failed, the pressure on the Lithuanian national democratic government has not been relaxed On June 3, Soviet forces surrounded the Lithuanian parliament building. The Lithuanian president, Vitautas Landsbergis, had to go on TV to appeal to the population to protect the government. Ten thousand people continued guarding the building into the early hours of the next morning.

On May 30, Landsbergis received a letter from the head of the Soviet General Staff, M. Moiseev, warning that the army had "the right to resort to any measure" if Lithuanian youth refused to accept conscription into the Soviet army.

Far worse pressures have been brought to bear on the long suffering Armenians. The Kremlin has stuck by its decisions to turn over the Armenians of Nagomo-Karabakh to the tender mercies of the Azerbaijani chauvinist government in Baku, which is totally controlled by the Communist Party.

At the end of May, Soviet special forces began deporting thousands of Armenians from the Shaumian district bordering Nagoro-Karabakh and from some villages in Nagorno-Karabakh also. This marks the first direct all-Union collaboration in the genocidal policies of the Azerbaijan Stalinist bureaucracy.

These actions have been interpreted by many observers as retailiation for a law passed by the Armenian parliament calling for the confiscation of the Communist Party's property. This measure was declared "unconstitutional" by the all-Union authorities. - G.F.

political platform, and a social base."

Regardless of what is actually involved in this, it can be expected that as the possibilities for political debate and for gaining experience in social and political mobilizations increase, there will be a differentiation in the opposition and formations will emerge that specifically represent the workers.

That will represent a much more radical challenge to the ruling bureaucrats than any of the major contenders in the June 12 elections, all of whom shared the basic assumptions of the bureaucracy.