CONTENTS.

Volume 230. No. 5

COVER
Edltorial: Reagan Rampant
Multinatlonal Agriculture:
The Profitsof Hunger

138 Deindustrializing America:

Richard J. Barnet

LETTERS
I30

The Wrong Reason

Draft Dodge
Iran Chooses
Economy Time
On Terrorism

Harry Maurer
EdMcConvrlle

149 Rifkln and Howard:

Aryeh Neler
Fred Halliday

The Emerging Order

150 Ellis:Revolution
After
the
152 La Fontaine: Selected Fables
154 Films

Meyer
Donald
Larzer Ziff
Ben Sonnenberg
Robert Hafch

Hans Kofirng

ARTICLES
I35 Slhanouk-Stlll on the Tlghtrope

Harry Brdl

BOOKS & THE ARTS

EDITORIALS
I3 1
132
I33
134
134

The RunawaySteel Industry

139 Of Human Damage:
A Life in Hard Times
142 Union Blacklists Are Back:
Dirty Trlcks Down South

WrrfredBurchetf

Drawings by M.G. Lord

Edrtor, Vlctor Navasky

Publrsher, Hamilton Flsh

Execurrve Editor. Rlchard Lingernan, Assocrate Edrtor, Kal Blrd; Asslstant Edrtor, Karen W~lcox;LlCerary Edrtor. Eluabeth Pochoda; Asststant
Lrlerary Edrlor, Amy Wilentz, Poetry Edrfor, Grace Schulman; Copy
Edrfor, Patrlcla Dowllng, Assrstant Copy Edrtor, SydneSdverstein;
Edrlortal Assrslant, Barbara Dudley Davis; Edrforral Secretary, Ola Lyon

Adverfrsrng Manager, Melinda Miller; Busrness Manager, Ann B.

Epstern; Clrculatron Manager, Glorla Sangster; Production Coordmalor,
Daphne Kis; Asslsfant to PubIdsheF, Karen Polk; Clawfred, Llndsey
Holtz;
Weinraub; Receptronlst, Greta Loell; Marl Clerk, John
Admmrsfralrve Secretary, Shlrley Sulat; Natron Assmrates, Claudlne
Bacher; Natron y e w s Servrce, Jeff Sorensen.

Departments: Archrtecture, JaneHoltz Kay, Art, Lawrence Alloway;

Dance, Nancy Goldner. Frlms, Robert Hatch, Indrgenous Musrc,
Nat Hentoff, MUSIC,
Davld Hamllton; Press, &chard Pollak, Televrsion,
Peter Sourlan, Thealer, Harold Clurman; Whrte House Correspondent,
Robert Sherrlll Correspondents: Bonn, C. Arnery; Canberru,
C P Fltzgerald, L a m Amerrca, PennyLernoux, London, Raymond
Wllllams. Parrs. Claude Bourdet. Columnrsfs and Regular Contrrburors.
Carey McWllllarns (Second Thoughts). Calvln Trlllm (Varrafrons),
Thomas Ferguson & Joel Rogers (The Polrtrcai Economy) Contrrbufrng
Edrtor, Blalr Clark EdrtorralBoard. James Baldwm, Norman Blrnbaum,
Rlchard Falk, FrancesFltzGerald, PhlhpGreen, Robert Lekachman,
Sidney Morgenbesser, Aryeh Neler. Marcus Raskm, A.W Slngham,
Alan Wolfe

EDITORIALS.
TheWro-ngReason
The last ternplatlon IS the greatest treason:
To do the nght deed for the wrong reason.

T . S . Eliot

support an Olympic boycott, but not for the reason

given by Pres~dentCarter. It seems to me at least
debatable whether an Olympic boycott is an appropriate way to protest the Soviet invasionof Afghanistan. On the other hand,it seems clear that an Olympic boycott is an appropriate response to the oppress~onof humanrlghts activists In the Soviet Union.
Sowet military intervention in Afghanistan must be condemned, though Jimmy Carters protestations would have
come wlth better grace if he had acknowledged its parallels
to Americanmditaryinterventlon
in smallcountries like
Cambodia. But I would favor going to the Olympics despite
my revulsion againstwhattheSowetUnion
is doing in

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Afghanistan. I believe that peaceful contacts between peoples are desirable, and taking part in the Olympics would be
no endorsement of the invasion, especially if some of the
athletes and spectatorsgoing to Moscow could be persuaded
to take part in a protest demonstration in Red Square.
There is another reason to oppose the use of a boycott
to protesttheAfghanistaninvaslon.Whatevervalueit
mlghthave was sullied byCarter when he made it part
of apackagethat
includes revival of draft registration,
support for Central Intelligence Agency covert operations
and military aid to General Zias Pakistan. A boycott is only
warranted as a moral gesture. It lacks that quality when it is
bracketed
with
support for a totalitarian
government
abroad and the abrogation of civil liberties at home.
A boycott of the Olympics toprotestpersecution
of
human-rights activists in the Soviet Union is a different matter. An editorialin The Nation last May 12 (Realpolitik
and HumanRights) suggested that the Soviet Union might
be persuaded to release Yuri Orlov, Anatoly Shcharansky
and other political prisoners because of the Olympics. [The

132

The Nation.

Draft Dodge

Soviet Unions] anticipated athletic triumphs would be tarnished by protests in behalf of Orlov and otherswho are detained, the editorial said, calling for increased pressure to
release dissenters. On October 10, 1979, Amnesty Internaf truth is the first casualt) of war, clvil liberties are
tional sounded the same theme
in an openletter to President
the first casualty of cold war. So it was the last time
Leonid Brezhnev: As the worlds peoples look toward
around andso President Carter seems intent on makMoscow in 1980, we appeal to your government to fulfill its
ing it again. First, he went after the Iranian students
human rights commitmentsunderinternatlonal
law, the
in the United States; then he launched a driveto Increase the
Soviet Constitution and legislation.
secrecy surroundingCentral
Intelllgence Agency covert
In its letter, Amnesty expressed its deep concern about the actlons; now he plans to bring back draft reglstration.
more than 300 prisoners of conscience in the Soviet Union,
In his speech at Georgetown University lastweek, Senator
among themnineteenmonitors
of the 1975 Helsinki
EdwardKennedyexposedthe
essent~al uselessness of
human-rights agreements who have been sentenced to pnsdraft registration in meeting future mobilizationneeds
on terms of up to fifteen years since 1075 and another five
rapidly, if they arise, as the Presldent put it. Registration,
who were in prison awaltlng trial. While making the OlymKennedy said, is thus the first step toward reinstltuting a
picsa focus of its appeal For their release, Amnesty charged
peacetime draft, a ,point Bertram M. Gross raised in these
that in antlcipation of the large number of foreign visitors
pages last year (The Drive to Revive the Draft, October
20, 1979). To put it bluntly, President Carter has not made
to Moscow during the Olympic Games
special measures
the case for registration, militarily, diplomatically or otherwere apparently bemg taken to cleardissidents
o u t of
wise; and so in policy terms it remains more symbol than
Moscow. The human-rights group pointed to the transfer
substance. In its effects on the lives of millions of young
of prisoners of conscience out of prisons and psychiatric
men and women, however, the substancewould be considerhospitals in o r nearthe
Moscow areaand Intodlstant
areas, evidence that some detentions were being extended
able-not onlytheabridgment
of their clvil llbertles but
also the amassing of still another centralized governmental
untd the Olympic Games
were concluded, and threats to
Baptists in the Moscow area that they would be forcibly redossier. Our experience in Vietnam should have taught us
that demanding sacrlfices from
our youth that turn out to be
settled at the time of the Olympic Games.
Since that letter was sent, signs that the Sovlet Unlon is
meanlngless only engenders cynicism and alienation. Even
clearing o u t dlssldents because of the Olympic Games have
in the unhkely event that the President does make a cogent
case for draft registration, there must be a great deal more
become unm~stakable. On January
15. Amnesty reported a
major crackdown on dlssenters In the Sowet Union. More
discussion of what sort of draft we should have and the
than forty arrests for the peaceful exercise of human rights
proper role of the mllitary in our soclety. As Gross pointed
had taken place during the three months that elapsed smce
out, such a discussion has so far been lacking, and Conthe Brezhnev letter. Among those arrested were nme addigress has merely tacked w ~ t hthe polltlcal wlnds.
tional members of groups monltoring the H e l s ~ n kaccords.
~
The Carter campalgnto punlsh Iran and the Soviet Union
The UnitedStates Helslnkl Watch Committee reports that
by deprivlng young Americans of their rlghts has encounother Soviet Helsrnkl monltorshave been called In and
tered little opposltion other than SenatorKennedys. But the
warned that their activ~t~es
would result in ban~shment from
proposal to revwe draft registration could still be a disguised
Moscow. Then on January 22, the most prominent of all
blessmg if it were to galvanize Americans of draft age from
Soviet human-rights actlvists, Andrei Sakharov,
was arrested
thelr lassitude. By demonstrating resistance to registration,
and banished from Moscow. His exile made it close to a
they might be able to return the country to its senses. In the
clean sweep; the Soviet Union has eliminated nearly all opearly 1960s, young Americans rallled to the cause of racial
portunities for vlsitors to the Olympic Games to talk to disequality
and
prodded
Congress
and the
President
to
senters. These dlssenters have been forced to suffer arrest,
enact and enforce civil rights laws. In the late 1960s and the
prosecution,imprisonment
and exrle simply because the
early 1970s, young Americans led the fight against the war
Olympic Games are belng held in Moscow; therefore, a boyin Vietnam andagainstthedraft.
Lately, however, few
cott IS clearly appropriate,
public causes have aroused
their .passions, and they have
Although the boycott is instead going forward for Presigotten out of the habit of taking the lead in awakening the
dent Carters reasons, there might still be a way to convey
American conscience.
the message that I t is intolerable that the Olympic Games
There Is a new coalition that should help mobilize not
should be used as an occasion to repress human rights. I f
only draft-age youths but also others who wish to join In
alternate games are held, they could be called the Sakharov
resistance to the draft. Known as the Committee Against
Games and the medals to be distributed could bear the likeRegistration and the Draft (CARD),it comprises more than
ness of Andrei Sakharov. Those would be prizes worth winforty civil liberties, church, student, antlwar and womens
ning.
ARYEH
NEIER
organizations. Its address is 245 Second Street, N.E.,
Washington, D.C. 20002, telephone (202) 5474334. The
Aryeh Neier, a member of The Nation s Edilorial Board, IS
Natron will also d o its part. We will help student groups and
adjuncl professor of law ai New York UnlverslIy and a felothers planning public discussions of the draft by arranging
low of ihe New York fnstrlufe for ihe Humanities.
for speakers andforreprints
of Grosss comprehensive

February 9. 1980