V. I. LENIN ON IMPERIALISM

Without forgetting the conditional and relative value of all definitions in general, which can never embrace all the concatenations of a phenomenon in its complete development, we must give a definition of imperialism that will include the following five of its basic features: (1) the concentration of production and capital has developed to such a high stage that it has created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life: (2) the merging of bank capital with industrial capital, and the creation, on this basis of this "finance capital," of a financial oligarchy; (3) the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities acquires exceptional importance; (4) the formation of international monopoly capitalist combines which share the world among themselves; and (5) the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed.

Imperialism is capitalism in that stage of development in which the dominance of monopolies and finance capital has established itself; in which the export of capital has acquired pronounced importance; in which the division of the world among the international trusts has begun; in which the division of all territories of the globe among the biggest capitalist powers has been completed.

Monopolies, oligarchy, the striving for domination instead of striving for liberty, the exploitation of an increasing number of small or weak nations by a handful of the richest or most powerful nations -- all these have given birth to those distinctive characteristics of imperialism which compel us to define it as parasitic or decaying capitalism. More and more prominently there emerges, as one of the tendencies of imperialism, the creation of the "rentier state," the usurer state, in which the bourgeoisie to an ever increasing degree lives on the proceeds of capital exports and by "clipping coupons." It would be a mistake to believe that this tendency to decay precludes the rapid growth of capitalism. It does not. In the epoch of imperialism, certain branches of industry, certain strata of the bourgeoisie and certain countries betray, to a greater or lesser degree, now one and now another of these tendencies. On the whole, capitalism is growing far more rapidly than before; but this growth is not only becoming more and more uneven in general, its unevenness also manifests itself, in particular, in the decay of the countries which are richest in capital (England). (Lenin, Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism)

As the quote from Lenin argues -- and this has been shown to be true by the development of capitalism for 50 years since Lenin wrote his book, Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism -- an important characteristic of modern capitalism is that it must export capital. The capitalists' money can't be profitably enough invested at home. U.S. imperialism is pouring investment money into "poor" countries because it has to find an outlet. This "surplus" of investment money leads to vast unemployment in countries like India. Then the intellectual-whores the imperialists employ to cover their stink turn around and say: "Countries like India are overpopulated. The land can't support all of them. It's their own fault for having so many damned children." You lie, is communism's answer. It is because the capitalists have "too much" money, which they've made by bleeding the people -- this "too much" money is what destroys these "poor" countries -- which makes them poor! -- and that leads to "too many" people. The answer to "too many" people is not to sterilize workers but to kill imperialism.

THE NATIONAL BOURGEOISIE: FRONT MEN FOR IMPERIALISM

Nowadays, imperialism often rules through local despots, front-men willing to sell the people to the highest bidder -- provided they get some crumbs. The "native" bourgeoisie (including the nationalists) is far too weak to "go it alone." Even doing something as ordinary (for capitalists) as getting a loan means they must go to a bank that's been taken over by U.S. banks. In other words, every step of the way the U.S. can squash these guys like fleas. In all the "poor" countries they have become mere adjuncts (politically and economically) to imperialist control, as "managers" fronting for U.S. boards of directors. (For a discussion of how this has developed in India, see PL magazine, September 1970, p. 38, "Indian Economy Imperialist Dominated," by A.K. Mokkherjee, A.K. Sengupta, and M. Chachrbourty.)

In phony "socialist" countries -- like Algeria and Cuba today, or the Ghana of Nkrumah, U.S. or sometimes Soviet, French or other imperialists control the economy as much as in any other colony. Take Nkrumah's Ghana, for instance:

The usual course for the socialist (sic!) governments has been the kind of tactic adopted in Ghana, where the rate of company tax was stiffened, wage increases of 20 percent were insisted on, plus an increased investment locally of 60 percent of net profits after tax. Since this left the mining companies still with dividend rates of 45 percent, the prospect did not terrify them. The companies now scrupulously steer clear of any direct interference in the national economy, and are rapidly "indigenizing" their staffs. (Note that since they of course control these "staffs," they would not any longer needs open interference.) But the "colonial" character of the economy remains. (P. Worsley, The Third World, 1964, p. 241, our emphasis).

Elitist bourgeois governments that call themselves socialist but negotiate deals (like the one Worsley describes above) allowing imperialism to stay (just as Cuban leaders have allowed Russia to replace the U.S. in its former position as official Strangler of the Economies) -- these fake-socialists provide no solution. Freedom from imperialist rule can only be achieved when you go all the way, when a mass based workers' and peasants' dictatorship seizes power. This means a dictatorship over the imperialists and domestic bourgeoisie and landlords. It means power and freedom for the vast majority of the people. Only workers' and peasants' rule -- socialism -- can develop the country for real, instead of relying on imperialist capital with all its ruinous effects.

In the openly neo-colonial areas (like Thailand or South Korea) and the neo-colonies with a "socialist" face (Algeria, Cuba) the people are terribly oppressed because the economies have been politically paralyzed so that imperialism can slowly, in its good time, devour their labor and resources.

And the only answer to this can be: POWER TO THE WORKERS!

WHY VIETNAM?

That empire in Southeast Asia is the last major resource area outside the control of any one of the major powers of the globe....I believe that the condition of the Vietnamese people, and the direction in which their future may be going, are at this stage secondary, not primary. (Senator McGee, D-Wyo., in the U.S. Senate, Feb. 17, 1965)

The countries of southeast Asia -- including Vietnam -- are the latest frontier for U.S. investment. There are many ways U.S. businessmen can invest in this area. Corporations can act on their own or in consortiums. For instance, here are some examples of single companies moving in: Westinghouse built a plant making welding-electrodes in Singapore; Texas Instruments, Fairchild, General Electric and Allis Chalmers each built plants in Singapore; Airco-Speer (of Air Reduction) is setting up a 100,000 square foot plants to make resistors starting early in 1970 in Singapore, and ESSO is building a $65 million refinery complex capable of handling 80,000 barrels of Mideast crude oil in Singapore. (Singapore is to become a tool-room and raw materials processing area for other Asian industries that are also owned by U.S. businessmen.) Scott Paper and Kimberly-Clark both build paper mills in Thailand. Electronics and petrochemicals are fast-growing industries in this area.

There are also numerous examples of consortium investments. (A consortium involves more than one company investing together.) Thus this method is being used by the big Koppers firms, from the U.S., in forming a 5-nation consortium that will back an iron-and-steel mill in South Korea. Dow Chemical, Skelly Oil, Allied Chemical and American Synthetic Rubber are entering joint ventures with the South Korean puppet government to set up petrochemical plants as part of a complex of 12 factories to be completed by 1971. (Incidentally, Japan and the U.S. together buy 70 percent of South Korea's exports and are the importers of most of the capital equipment (machinery) used in that neo-colony.

Another consortium is "P.T. Ness Industries-Indonesia" in Jakarta. This capital for this investment was provided by ten U.S. electronics and machinery outfits subscribing somewhere between $30,000 and $60,000 each to provide the initial financing for this project.

Holding an authorized capital of $40 million, the "Private Investment Company for Asia" is another, larger consortium investment. Many key U.S. banks and corporations -- like Caltex, Bank of America, Chase Manhattan, GM, IBM, ITT, Union Carbide, United Fruit, and so on -- have $200,000 subscriptions in PICA.

An older method of penetrating and controlling the development of new industry in this area is through the World Bank and its affiliates -- like the International Development Association (IDA) and International Finance Corporation (IFC) -- all of which are run by top U.S. bosses. World Bank, IFC and IDA mainly make investments in what economists call the "infrastructure" of Asian countries. ("Infrastructure" refers to the inner economic structure of society -- like roads, docks and the rest of the transportation system, water, sewerage and the other necessary public services, electric power, communications, etc., things in other words that any capitalist needs to produce and sell goods, and make a profit. The whole capitalist class needs a well-working infrastructure to keep things going, but many aspects of infrastructure are not very profitable for individual capitalists or banks to run. It's much more profitable for them to lend government organizations money to build these things, and then get a return of such loans for many years.) World Bank, IDA and IFC lower the imperialists' overhead costs by building up the infrastructure of "poor" countries so U.S. imperialists can move around efficiently and milk these countries in a thorough-going way. Either IFC or IDA were behind each of the following infrastructure investments:

In Thailand -- cement and cement sheets, steel rolling mill, concrete pipe, asbestos, highways;

In Malaysia -- electric power

In Taiwan -- railways;

In Singapore -- electric power and electric power distribution systems;

In Indonesia -- cement and highways. (24)

This all adds up to once conclusion: the U.S. ruling class has its eye on Southeast Asia. It isn't willing to lose a single part of it.

Looking at South Vietnam itself, between 1960 and 1965 -- even before the massive U.S. troop invasion took place -- there was $100 million in private investment. Vimytex, owned by H.P. Jen of 30 Church St., New York City, has a textile mill employing 2,000 workers. Johnson and Johnson runs another textile mill. Parsons and Whitemore runs a paper mill. Sugar mill "pioneer" Herbert Fuller promoted a $10 million operation in the coastal city of Tuy Hao:

"I am in it for the money," Fuller says. "We could get back our investment in two years." Like all entrepreneurs Fuller once again is pushing ahead with his plans because he assumes that the U.S. is now committed to saving South Vietnam. (Fortune Magazine, March, 1966.)

Anyway, various U.S. government agencies have probably granted Fuller full insurance against revolution ....

Businessmen (in Saigon) are predicting more of the same war-oriented U.S.-supported economy for the foreseeable future. And none of the scores of U.S. firms -- from Philco-Ford to IBM -- working on U.S. government contracts in Vietnam has any immediate plans for a phaseout. In fact, some think the reorientation of U.S. assistance toward economic, instead of military, pursuits, might create new opportunities. The outlook is for a stretched-out reduction in U.S. military strength ... commensurate with the progress of Saigon's own military establishment. Without saying so, Hanoi is expected to carry out its own phased withdrawal from the South. One likely ending for this scenario ... is a de facto partition of South Vietnam with areas controlled by the Vietcong more or less coexisting with regions administered by Saigon. The confrontation would thus gradually shift from its present military form to an economic and political competition. (Business International magazine, a weekly report to managers of worldwide operations, 9/26/69.)

U.S. capitalists are clearly serious about the potential in Vietnam. More evidence on this is provided by the U.S.-government-commissioned study, The Post-War Development of the Republic of Vietnam, put together under the leadership of David Lilienthal and Vu Quoc Thuc, which appeared in mid-1969. This $2 million research project was ordered by the government following the 1966 Manila Conference. Lilienthal was then president of the Development and Resources Corporation, an imperialist outfit that "advises governments of poor countries." The study advises southern Vietnam to invite at least $2 1/2 billion in foreign investment between 1969 and 1979. It predicts that, generally speaking, southern Vietnam will become a prime target for a huge variety of capital goods (factory machinery) as well as a market for non-luxury goods. (25)

Thus U.S. businessmen have a long-range perspective on Vietnam. This is typified by M.L. Long, a top manager of Philco-Ford's Vietnam operation. This company is now working on government contracts worth over $32 million a year and employing some 3,000 Vietnamese and south Korean workers. But Long sets his sights firmly on private, non-military business in south Vietnam:

Given a fairly early end to the Vietnam war and a long-term U.S. economic commitment to Southeast Asia, Long looks forward to getting some $1.7 billion (!) in business throughout the area through 1971. (Business Week, Sept. 9, 1967.)

Preparing for this "great future" the U.S.-puppet regime in south Vietnam has thoroughly developed its strike-breaking abilities. Thus when power-generating plant workers walked off the job in early 1968, the Saigon police chief broke up a strike meeting, dragooned more than 100 scabs to back up the bosses manning Saigon's seven generating plants, arrested strike leaders and eventually broke the strike. Which is of course the same sort of thing the U.S. bosses' government does at home. (26)

The picture is clear. The Vietnam war is intimately bound up with the urgent economic needs of the U.S. imperialist system. For one thing, Vietnam is itself an important long-term investment area and source of raw materials and markets. Secondly, it is of strategic military-political importance for all of southeast Asia, a very populous area with unsurpassed mineral resources. And indeed, reversing the Vietnamese working people's revolutionary thrust -- through military and political counter-revolutionary efforts -- is vital to U.S. imperialism, which must teach all Asian and other working people: you can't beat imperialism. You can't fight back.

The U.S. government's would-be lesson is a lie. Working people can fight imperialism and -- as long as revolutionary forces rely on the people, and fight through to the end -- the workers can win. This, the real lesson, stands out clearly from the history of People's War in Vietnam.

Working people of all countries -- support each others struggles!

POWER TO THE WORKERS!

* * * * *

THE POOR GET POORER: WONDER WHY?

Since 1965 the GNP's of Ghana and Indonesia declined 5 percent. There was no increase in India. In Brazil and Kenya there was only a 1 percent increase since 1965. Average prices of raw commodities exported by poor countries have dropped 7 percent in the last decade. (Wall Street Journal, Jan. 31, 1968, pp. 1, 21)

THE WORKERS WILL WIN!

Workers' struggles are growing, communism is on the rise in the working class, racism is being more vigorously fought and nationalist paths are being rejected -- indeed, the future is bright!

Perhaps the ruling class can solidify itself in the next couple of years, perhaps it can line up behind some "super" liberal on a white charger, or events may weaken the ruling class even more and push it to the Right. Fascism may come, but the bigger danger is from the liberals. While liberalism still has some ability to delude many people, the economic base of capitalism limits the ability of the ruling class -- liberal or conservative -- to thrown even a few bones to the people. The near future for the ruling class is bleak -- whichever path it pursues.

Workers and oppressed people on the march all over the globe will prove too much for U.S. imperialism. History is on the side of the workers, armed with Marxism-Leninism. The four horsemen of imperialism: anti-communism, revisionism, racism, and nationalism will be destroyed by a united working class. (PL, Sept., 1970, editorial.)

FOOTNOTES

1. G. William Domhoff, Who Rules America?, Prentice-Hall, 1967, ch. 4; Robert Heilbronner, The Future as History, pp. 124-6: C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite, 1956, p. 122; Gabriel Kolko, The Roots of American Foreign Policy, pp. 13-26, 140-142.

2. Jan Pen, A Primer on International Trade, Vintage, 1967, p. 83.

3. Statistical Abstract, 1967.

4. See Business International, issues of 8/4/67, 9/1/67, 10/13/67

5. Business Abroad magazine, 9/4/67, "Productivity Abroad vs. the Balance of Payments"; also see H.H. Fowler in Steiner and Cannon, Multinational Corporate Planning, New York, 1966, ch. 8.

6. McGraw-Hill, Markets: Overseas Operations of U.S. Industrial Companies: 1965-67, p. 6

7. Estimates compiled from Statistical Abstract 1967 and Office of Business Economics, "Foreign Grants and Credits by the U.S. Government"; see Gabriel Kolko, The Politics of War, on U.S. role in post-war Europe.

8. Elliott Haynes, in International Development Review, June, 1965, p. 14; also New York Times, 2/11/66.

9. Time magazine, Dec. 29, 1967, p. 56.

10. Statistical Abstract 1967; J.L. Angel, Directory of American Firms Operating in Foreign Countries, preface and introduction.

11. "U.S. Share of World Markets for Manufactured Products," U.S. Dept. of Commerce, March, 1964, pp. 2-10; also see Machinery and Allied Products Institute Statement, 4/29/60, "Measures to Expand U.S. Exports."

12. First National City Bank (NY), Monthly Economic Letter, March, 1967, p. 34.

13. See for instance Business Abroad, 2/5/68, on increasing Japanese interest in Taiwan and south Korea. Also Business Abroad, 12/25/67, for Dominican Republic, p. 15, and on South Korea, Wall Street Journal, 1/24/68, p. 1.

14. Ryans and Baker, World Marketing: A Multinational Approach, N.Y., 1967, quote from McLean's "Financing Overseas Expansion," pp. 146-67.

15. Heather Dean, Scarce Resources, pub. by Research, Information and Publications Project, Student Union for Peace Action, Canada, May, 1966; on U.S. oil exploration abroad see Michael Tanzer, The Political Economy of International Oil, Boston, 1969.

16. See Lansberg, Fishman and Fisher, Resources in America's Future, Baltimore, 1963, pp. 430-468 and Business Week 9/18/48, p. 25-26 and 12/16.50, p. 26.

17. Harry Magdoff, "Economic Aspects of U.S. Imperialism," Monthly Review, Nov. 1966, p. 39.

18. See Business International, 12/5/69

19. See Business Abroad, 2/5/68. Also, The National Foreign Trade Convention in late 1967 was reported in Business Abroad for 11/13/67; they viewed the Far East and Indonesia in particular as "the world's largest new frontier for international business."

20. See A.G. Frank, Capitalism and Underdevelopment in Latin America, 1967. Much of this book applies to the Far East as well.

21. J.E. Meade, The Economic Journal, vol. 77, no. 306, p. 249.

22. David A. Baldwin, Economic Development and American Foreign Policy, 1943-62, Chicago, 1966. Also, Mountjoy, Industrialization and Underdeveloped Countries, London, 1966, pp. 155-156.

23. Business International, 11/24/67, p. 376. In most poor countries there is a substantial advantage to wage labor if the rulers can get it over the subsistence economy that is being disintegrated; see International Labour Review, March, 1966, pp. 281-301, article by Keji Taira. In Latin America the percentage of the working population that are wage-laborers is often twice the average for the Far East. The wages are also twice what Far Eastern wages are; see Yearbook of Labour Statistics 1966, International Labour Office, Geneva.

24. See Business International for 1968 and 1969.

The Mekong Delta is being surveyed by U.S. teams for a huge power project to provide power in southern Vietnam as well as nearby countries.

25. Business Abroad, 6/69, p. 9.

26. Business Week, 2/3/68, p. 37.

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