International Connections of US Peace Groups - III

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SC No. 07248/68

Central Intelligence Agency
28 February 1968

MEMORANDUM

SUBJECT: International Connections of US Peace Groups - III

1. We have continued to keep a close watch on the international connections of individuals and groups active in the US peace movement. During the two months since our last review of this activity,* there have been no major developments on the peace front nor has any new information come to light that would lead us to alter the conclusions reached in our original study.**

* SC-05701-67, 21 December 1967

** SC-05698-67, "International Connections of US Peace Groups," 15 November 1967.

2. Contacts and communications on the international peace network appear to have dropped off sharply from the peak levels reached around the time of the world-wide protest demonstrations in October and the second session of the "International War Crimes Tribunal" in December. The only noteworthy events so far this year involving American activists on the international level were the release of three more prisoners of war and the large demonstrations against the Vietnam war held in West Berlin. [...] The following paragraphs discuss aspects of these recent developments.

3. Continuing coordination between US peace activists and the North Vietnamese, a development reviewed at length in our original study, was evident [...] The leading US activist, David Dellinger, was the principal contact for Hanoi in arranging the return of the three American prisoners earlier this month. Dellinger claimed publicly that the North Vietnamese had asked him to nominate two peace leaders to receive the prisoners in Hanoi and accompany them on their return to the US. [...] escorted the prisoners as far as Vientiane, where the officers elected to transfer to US military aircraft.) The "Defense Committee" organized by Dellinger and Tom Hayden in November (see our report on 21 December 1967) to "encourage the release" of POWs and "defend" their rights presumably was instrumental in the negotiations with Hanoi, but no evidence of this has come to hand.

4. [...]

5. Hanoi also kept in touch with peace activists involved in other enterprises. For example, its women's front sent messages to women's peace organizations in Western Europe and the US (Women Strike for Peace) urging all-out support for former Representative Jeanette Rankin's peace march in Washington.

6. [...]

7. The much ballyhooed "Vietnam Congress" held in West Berlin in mid-February was largely an all-German show. Despite speculation that a number of leading lights among US peace workers--including Dellinger and Stokely Carmichael--would attend, no major US leader turned up. American participation was limited to SNCC activist Dale Allen Smith and four little-noted members of Students for a Democratic Society.

8. Ralph Schoenman's activities seem to have taken a significant new turn. [...] The special target of Schoenman's efforts since his arrival here reportedly has been the Black Power movement, and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in particular. His objective apparently is to involve militant negro elements actively in the anti-Vietnam war agitation and to forge organizational links between the two movements. He hopes to achieve this by convincing the racist organizations that their struggle for "liberation" and the struggle against the war have the same adversary and are fundamentally the same struggle.

9. This is not an entirely new tack for Schoenman. His marked Trotskyite tendencies have predisposed him as much toward revolutionary struggle as toward peace. He has been an exponent of the "war of liberation" and a particular admirer of Che Guevara and the doctrines of Castro. Stokely Carmichael's vision of a "Third World" liberating itself from white oppression is one which is not only congenial to Schoenman's way of thinking but one which can be readily adapted to the Vietnam cause.

10. Schoenman claims to have carried his appeal to all the major Black Power strongholds in the US and to have been accepted by at least some militant groups. Much of this can be put down to Schoenman's tendency to exaggerate and to inflate his own importance. It would be surprising if more than a few Black Power advocates found either Schoenman himself or his ideas very appealing. Aside from a few internationally oriented leaders, the militant Negro movement has shown little interest in peace issues. Their concern over Vietnam generally is limited to such areas as the draft and racial discrimination in the services. Many Negro activists would, of course, be quite willing to use Schoenman, his funds, and his extensive contacts to serve their own ends.

11. Schoenman's missionary work among the Negro militants reportedly has produced several results. [...]

12. In addition, Schoenman and John Wilson of SNCC have been involved in the establishment of a "commission" whose purpose will be to draw the various black communities into the war resistance movement. The composition and tactics of the commission, which will be staffed largely by SNCC personnel, are to be worked out at a "conference" to be held at some time in the future, possibly the national conference on "Blacks Against the Draft and In Resistance to the War" which Schoenman and SNCC leaders reportedly have been planning for April.

Dissident Youth: The Dynamics of Protest - Part 3

VI. Because of the revolution in communications, the ease of travel, and the evolution of society everywhere, regardless of nationality, today's students share many values in common.

A. They communicate effectively with each other without regard to any institutional framework or national boundaries. Language barriers are almost non-existent.

B. Their common outlook is likely to influence the demands they make on government.

VII. In the last nine months, student dissidents have closed down universities in 20 countries, succeeding in several instances in bringing about changes in government policy.

A. Europe--perhaps the most violent demonstrations have taken place in West Germany and France. In France by far the vast majority of those who took part in last May's violence sought to coerce an educational system, which has not changed appreciably since Napoleon's time, into entering the 20th Century. A relative few sought to topple what they consider a "corrupt" and "dehumanizing" government and cultivated an alliance with young industrial workers whom they sensed were chafing under onerous trade union and management direction. In the Federal Republic a small band of ultra-radicals, chiefly at the Free University in Berlin, has been able to disrupt educational routine and bring down civil authorities by exploiting the mistrust which many young Germans have for their elders' political judgment and its mistrust of government by coalition.

B. Student political activism has a long history in the Far East. In Japan, for example, the students have been accommodated in the political process and function as a quasi-legitimate opposition. They operate under popularly sanctioned ground rules. In Indonesia, students fought the Japanese occupation in wartime and were in the vanguard of the struggle for independence from the Dutch. They were a fiercely nationalistic bulwark of Sukarno's regime--only to turn against Sukarno with the support of the army when his complicity in the attempted Communist coup became known.

C. If education is necessary in most places for advancement, it is doubly so in Africa where a degree means lifetime tenure in the civil service. African students see little chance for employment in business--much of which still is owned by foreign stockholders and controlled by European management--and have less interest in employment which would take them away from what pass for urban areas. They prefer to remain in the cities and press for "prestige" jobs in government.

D. Until recently, Latin American students were guaranteed a voice in running the universities by custom and a 50-year-old Argentine law which was adhered to throughout the area. They were cultivated and exploited by government and opposition leaders alike and figured in the downfall of a score of governments. Lately, however, most Latin American governments have begun to deprive the universities of legal autonomy and to employ force to put down student demonstrations. In several countries the outcome is in doubt. In Mexico, for example, a strong, stable one-party government faces increasing student opposition fueled by resentment over the capital's dictation of nominations to local political office and its monopoly over every segment of national life. In Brazil, restive students are not likely to bring down the government--but their demonstrations may result in hardline military elements pressuring the government to adopt harshly repressive measures.

VIII. There is no convincing evidence of Communist control of student dissidents.

A. The most vocal of the dissidents everywhere are wary of being caught up in organizations controlled by Moscow, by its allies, or by either the Chinese or Cubans. And they are scathingly critical of "neanderthal" local Communist leaderships whose aspirations toward parliamentary participation they denounce. In Italy and France, student riots have cost the Communists electoral strength.

B. Moscow can take little comfort from any of this, even if it exacts fleeting advantage from whatever confusion the dissidents cause the United States and its allies.

IX. In the long run, the Communists will have to deal with their own young people who are increasingly alienated by the oppressive features of Soviet life.

A. There is ample evidence that Soviet youth are disillusioned with the political regime and despair of working effectively through it or of finding any alternative, and that they seek compensation outside the system, i.e., material comforts, rewarding personal relationships, etc.

B. Polish and Yugoslav youth already have rioted against the Gomulka and Tito regimes--demanding that they live up to the promise of a better life and that marginally qualified party stalwarts relinquish managerial and government posts to university-trained specialists who are capable of administering expanding economies.

C. Finally, we should mention China and Mao Tse-tung's Red Guard. Superficially, there are striking parallels between the Red Guards and the student militants elsewhere. In actual fact, the Guards were brought into existence and are protected by the highest levels of the Chinese regime. Except for a brief period, the Guards have been kept alive by Mao and the radical clique about him despite the damage they have caused to the economy and to orderly administration of the state. Their targets have been chosen by Mao and his extremist advisers. In short, the regime uses the Red Guards to strike down or intimidate officials it considers unreliable.

X. The children of a generally affluent generation--West or East--are less concerned with matters of economic livelihood or the challenge of building a revolutionary state on the ruins of autocratic rule than were their parents and some, at least, are deeply engrossed in the search for some newer means of arriving at moral values. For the moment, they seem to have settled on a reaffirmation of the dignity of the individual. Most commentators agree that Society's values are in flux; if this is so, restless youth are symptomatic of a deeper current than their numbers alone suggest.

The Student Explosion

1967 STUDENTS

FRANCE - 600,000

INDIA - 1,100,000

TURKEY - 100,000

USSR - 4,300,000

JAPAN - 1,200,000

WEST GERMANY - 370,000

USA - 6,300,000

UK - 350,000

ITALY - 465,000

Escalating Tactics and Techniques of Youthful Activists

- sniping
- burn and destroy
Paris:
- charge (attack) the police or troops
- "body work" on opposition or police
- barricades
San Francisco State:
- break-ins
- vandalize or destroy files; sabotage; damage by paint, etc. (Either as part of sit-in or by "hit and run")
- besiege offices; hold persons as hostages
Berlin:
- resist arrest
Sproul Hall (Dec. 1964):
- go limp
- if arrested go quietly
- plan to stay until victory or arrest
Columbia (one group):
- plan to dispurse at fixed time or on request
- sit-ins
- march-ins, etc. (unauthorized) block intersections, streets
- rallies, etc. (contrary to rules or laws)
- harassment of opponents or administrators
- boycott or "strike"
Rome:
- stand-ins, mill-ins
- picket lines
- march-ins, parades (authorized, with permits)
- rallies, mass meetings, teach-ins, etc. (authorized)
- dialogues and negotiations
- petitions

Dissident Youth: The Dynamics of Protest - Part 2

IV. Protest begins with minor confrontations between university authorities and a small but determined group of dissenters whose complaints have grown out of some aspect of university life (not necessarily dramatic).

A. The authorities fail to respond [in some countries real authority is reserved to government ministries and the nominal university leaders are little more than figureheads; in other cases, they merely procrastinate] and the dissidents become increasingly vocal and aggressive and may engage in "dress rehearsals," such as attempts to mar faculty convocations. This was the scenario at Nanterre, outside Paris, and at the Free University of Berlin.

1. An unplanned, spontaneous incident--perhaps the arrest off campus of a student--provides a dramatic rallying point and picket lines or sit-ins are organized.

2. The dissidents, under pressure from all sides, seek to legitimize their stance by demanding more and more; the authorities reluctantly dribble out piecemeal concessions which feed the popular view that the militants now have seized the initiative.

3. The militants, in turn, press the authorities to the point that they balk.

4. Reconciliation becomes impossible and the authorities resort to force. A cause celebre results. A decision by the administration at Columbia to proceed with the construction of a much disputed gymnasium, for example, was transformed by the effects of police intervention into an assault on the very structure of the university.

V. Student demonstrations are expressive, rather than directed.

A. They are intended to dramatize an issue, rather than to obtain the relief of a specific grievance. The demonstration, itself, becomes the focal point. It is intended to capture public notice.

1. This view of the efficacy of the tactics of confrontation can be traced to the experiences of the young people who participated in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States at the beginning of this decade.

2. Those young people attracted public attention and because of public opinion were able to overturn antiquated social customs or local statutes not sanctioned by the Constitution.

3. In doing so, they won the approbation of many observers and their tactics were studied closely by young people elsewhere.

4. Today's dissidents sense that latent support for their position exists among non-radical students and that it can be galvanized in much the same way that participants in the Civil Rights Movement won support.

B. For this reason, the dissidents welcome the intrusion of the news media.

1. It is moot whether television or newsreel coverage of a student outbreak can spark similar demonstrations elsewhere. It does seem likely, however, that by their emphasis on violence, police intervention, etc., the media probably add to the intensity and the duration of a disturbance.

2. They also evoke the sympathy of other students.

Dissident Youth: The Dynamics of Protest - Part 1

I. Youthful dissidence is a phenomenon of our time.

A. It is shaped everywhere by local conditions, but nonetheless there are striking similarities world-wide--especially in the more advanced countries. As the lesser developed countries progress on the economic scale and as their student populations grow, it is likely to become even more commonplace.

B. Some measure of dissidence is traceable to the age-old conflict between generations or to psychiatric problems on the part of a few of the participants.

C: But much--probably most of it--has other roots.

1. It stems from the astounding growth of student populations in the last 15 to 20 years.

a. Many of the new generation of European, Latin American, and Asian students are from lower or lower-middle class families; they have first-hand knowledge of the socio-economic ills of the day. They expect at the least that the instruction they receive will prove functional. All too often it is not: curricula geared to yesteryear's elites do not meet the requirements of mass education in 1968.

2. It derives from the conditions of student life in much of the world, particularly in the metropolitan universities of Europe--woefully outmoded and overcrowded facilities, poor housing and the failure of communication between administrative authorities, faculty members and students.

3. Finally, it is attributable to skillful leadership and growing cynicism.

a. This cynicism, particularly in Europe, is the consequence of the failure of political parties and other institutions to accommodate themselves to the economic advances and social changes which have taken place since World War II, to the absence of compelling ideological issues in an era of relative affluence, and the diminution everywhere of the moral authority of the family, the church, the state.

b. Many parties--for example, the Socialists in Italy and Germany, the Communists in most Western countries--no longer are issue-oriented or responsive to the constituencies they purport to represent. A younger generation finds government controlled by a generation which came to maturity 25 years ago and remains committed more to preserving power than to renovating society.

c. The dissidents find support for their critical view of society in the works of a handful of neo-Marxist social critics, in Mato-Tse-tung's advocacy of mass movements, and in the romantic example provided by two ex-student revolutionaries--Fidel Castro and Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Their attachment to Guevara, whose legend grows steadily, is revealing because the dissidents have very few live heroes.

II. The interplay of emotions, ideologies, and attitudes which constitute the motive force behind protest is infinitely complex.

A. Those who would lead the dissidents must identify and exploit issues which promise a wide following.

1. Naturally, some issues prove more effective than others and evoke a greater response.

2. Naturally, too, these issues change or are replaced by broader demands as protest evolves and a confrontation ensues--as at Columbia or the Sorbonne.

B. Few single issues can impel large numbers to demonstrate, but US involvement in Vietnam is most evocative, especially if it is linked to a real or alleged US involvement locally or to an unpopular action by the local government.

1. The Vietnamese conflict is the first major war in the lifetime of most of the student dissidents who are prone to be highly critical of "great power politics."

2. The radical German students, for example, criticize us for our role in Vietnam at the same time that they demonstrate against the Kiesinger government because of its advocacy of the so-called emergency laws. Arab students charge us with complicity in a "Zionist conspiracy" aimed at establishing Israeli hegemony in the Middle East.

III. The university is the locus of protest because, first of all, it is the institution which most closely affects the lives of the protesters. In the words of a statement issued in 1959 by a group of young American radicals: "We are people of this generation, bred in at least modest comfort, housed in universities, looking uncomfortably to the world we are to inherit....What are the social forces that exist or must exist if we are to be successful? And what role have we ourselves to play as a social force?" (Port Huron Statement)

A. Many of the dissidents believe that modern society is highly centralized and that its critical institutions are closely interrelated and able to blunt most forms of peaceful protest. But they also believe that society abhors the kind of noisy, forceful demonstration which impedes the smooth operation of any one of its parts.

B. Consequently, they think that by closing down the university they can force society against its will to listen to their complaints.

C. Sociologists and psychologists call the process whereby students are drawn to participate in protest radicalization. There is little agreement over the dynamics involved--and less evidence that any great number remain radicalized once the exhilaration of combat is past. Nevertheless, a few certainly do find that their outlook has been altered.

APPENDIX B: American Organizations Participating in Anti-Vietnam War Activities

Abraham Lincoln Brigade

Ad Hoc Committee for Peace in Vietnam

Afro-Americans Against the War in Vietnam

American Friends Service Committee

American Independent Movement

American Underground

Assembly of Unrepresented People

Atlanta Workshop in Non-Violence

Brooklyn Chapter, DuBois Clubs of America

Brooklyn Residents for Peace

Campus Christian Ministry

Campus Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Catholic Peace Fellowship

Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors

Chicago Branch Socialist Workers Party

Chicago Peace Action Council

Chicago Women for Peace

Citizens Coordinating Committee on Vietnam

Citizens of Conscience, Washington Heights and Inwood

Cleveland Area Peace Action Council

Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy

Committee for Direct Action to End the War in Vietnam

Committee for Independent Political Action

Committee for Non-Violent Action

Committee of Returned Volunteers (Peace Corps)

Committee on Democratic Education

Committee to Aid the Vietnamese People

Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Committee to End the War in Vietnam, University of Wisconsin

Communist Party of the USA

Congress of Racial Equality

Connecticut Area Mobilization Committee

Delaware Concerned Citizens About Vietnam

Diggers

Direct Action Committee

East Coast Front for United Action

Education Action Mobilization

Emma Lazarus Federation of Jewish Women's Clubs, New Haven Branch

Episcopal Peace Fellowship

Faculty-Student Committee To Stop the War in Vietnam

Fifth Avenue Vietnam Peace Parade

Foreign Policy Council at New York Democrats Vietnam Dollar Fund

Friends Peace Committee

Greater Seattle Committee of Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam

Henry Forbes Club

Houston Citizens for Action on Vietnam

Hyde Park Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Individuals Against the Crime of Silence

Inter-University Committee for Debate on Foreign Policy

Italian Committee of the Vietnam Day Committee (Associazione del Lavoratori Christiani)

Kansas City Area Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Labor Committee To End the War in Vietnam

Luthern Campus Center for the University of Washington

Milwaukee Organizing Committee

Milwaukee Young Socialists

Minnesota Mobilization Committee

Mobilization Against War

National Citizens Campaign for New Initiatives to End the War in Vietnam

National Committee, Communist Party of the USA

National Conference for New Politics

National Continuations Committee

National Coordinating Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Northwest Convention of Federated Auxiliary of International Longshoremen and Warehousemen's Union

Northwest Regional Conference to End the War in Vietnam

Negotiate Now!

New York Peace Mobilizations

Peace Action Council

Paris American Committee to Stop the War in Vietnam (PACS)

Peace and Freedom Movement

Princeton Ad Hoc Committee to Bring about Negotiations in Vietnam

Progressive Labor Party, Puerto Rican Club

Port Chicago Peace Vigil

Port Chicago Vigil

Portland Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Puerto Rican Independence Movement

Resist

Resistance, (The)

Revolutionary Committee of the Fourth International

San Antonio Committee To Stop the War in Vietnam

San Francisco State College

Seattle Spring Mobilization Committee

Sixth AD Club

Socialist Labor Party

Socialist Workers Party

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Spartacist

Spokane Committee for Peace in Vietnam (also Spokane Citizens for Peace in Vietnam)

Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam

Students for a Democratic Society

Students for Socialist Action

Students Mobilization Committee

Students National Spring Mobilization

Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee

Student Peace Union

Student Strike for Peace Conference

Sunset Club of the San Francisco County CP

Swarthmore Draft Resisters Union

Trade Unionists for Peace

Teachers Committee for Peace in Vietnam

United Campus Action Committee

United Peoples' Committee

University Committee on War and Peace

University of Chicago Student Mobilization

US Campaign

Veterans and Reservists to End the War in Vietnam

Veterans for Peace in Vietnam

Vietnam Summer

Vietnam Veterans Against the War

Vietnam Week Peace Mobilization

War Resisters League of Northern California

Washington Area Committee to End the War in Vietnam

W.E.B. DuBois Clubs of America

Western District Mobilization Against War

Western Spring Mobilization

Wisconsin Draft Resistance

Women for Peace

Women's International League for Peace and Freedom

Women's Peace and Unity Club, Chicago

Women Strike for Peace

Women's World Party

Workers World Party

World Workers Party

Yellow Springs Peace and Freedom Council

Young Socialist Alliance

Young Socialist Alliance, Chicago

Young Social Alliance - Socialist Workers Party

Youth Against War and Fascism

8. THE BERTRAND RUSSELL PEACE FOUNDATION (BRPF)

The BRPF cannot be classified as an American "peace" organization per se. However, a substantial number of US citizens are involved in this activity, and particularly in its offspring, the "International War Crimes Tribunal" (IWCT). The major operator in both organizations is Ralph B. Schoenman, the American who is Lord Russell's personal secretary.

The BRPF, which Schoenman serves as director, has been described by Lord Russell as an organization "to investigate the causes of the Cold War and to pursue such measures as may diminish and eliminate the risk of war." Despite these aims, the BRPF rarely takes an objective approach to international problems. Its principal activities, largely governed by Schoenman, involve agitation against alleged US "imperialism" and advocacy of "Che Guevara" type revolutionary movements. (The latter interest apparently prompted Schoenman's recent excursion to Bolivia, from where he was deported to the US.)

Schoenman can perhaps best be described as an extreme leftist with Trotskyite tendencies. His views are so "red" that even the British Communist Party regards him with little enthusiasm.

7. WAR RESISTERS' LEAGUE (WRL)

The WRL, headquartered in New York City, is the American affiliate of War Resisters International (WRI). THe WRI dates back to the early 1920's and has a long record of helping pacifists and their national organizations around the world in working for peace and in aiding conscientious objectors financially and in other ways.

Although the WRL is a non-partisan pacifist organization of long standing, recently it has been active in promoting resistance to the draft and desertion from the US forces. It has emerged as one of the more active overt agencies assisting US servicemen who wish to desert their posts.