Roanoke Rapids daily herald., 1948-10-07
Thompson Says
There Should Be
Laws Against Wa"&
THOMPSON
DOrthy Thompson

The issue over which to have
a showdown with the Russians
is not, I think, over Berlin or
any other secondary question.
Neither Berlin, Western Un-
ion, Palestine nor any other SUBJ
ordinate question is the burning
issue for mankind. The burn
ing issue is how to abolish war
not how to prevent a war but
how to make any war I'M
possible.
On the question Of principle
there cannot be two opinions
Divided war-making power
means war. The only way
peace ever has been obtained
and maintained within any
nation is by the disarmament OF
every body but one, that one
being the body charged to en-
force the judgments of the Law.
The only way peace ever will
be maintained between nations
is the same way.
There must be a law against
war and preparation for war.
That law must prohibit the
manufacture of all categories of
mass destruction weapons; it
must set quotas for other
weapons; it must outlaw con
scription; it must provide con-
troll over the flow of the raw
materials essential to the crea-
ton of mass destruction wea-
pons; it must establish courts
before which individuals accus-
ed of infringement can be tried;
and it must establish punish
ments for the guilty.
Otherwise there will be an =
other war. That war will end
by the conqueror imposing total
disarmament on the defeated
and establishing, in fact, an he
gemony over the globe. We
then will have lasting interna-
tional peace, but only after an
atomic war of incalculable hor-
ror, destruction and mania,
which will make the subsequent
policing of the world all but
impossible and end every
vestige of liberty.
1t is to this issue that t he
United States should address it..
self at all times. Mr.. Vishinsky
is weakest of al on the atomic
issue. Though Ia. repeatedly
calls for the pxx1bition of "a
tonic weapons, he rejects the
American control plan. In the
Atomic Commission, the Rus :
slams never rejected the princi-
pie Of control. But they also,
as the published United Nations
record shows, never came out
with counter-proposals includ-
ing control measures.
Though Mr.. Vishisky said in
his Friday speech that the Am
erican atomic plan provided no
truly international organ to in
spect atomic activities" but
rather ian American-dominated
organ" he introduced no argu-
ment in proof of this bald state
ment, nor did he offer any other
control plan which would be, in
his opinion, truly interna-
tional. He merely re-stated
the Russian position: First, pro
hibit atomic weapons and then
establish international control,
while the Americans (and all the
rest of the world except the U.
S. S. r. and its satellites) have
held that prohibition control and
enforcement are integral, as in
deed they are in every law.
Suppose the U. N. and the U.
S. A. should accept Mr.. Vishin-
sky's proposal, and rule that no
more atomic weapons should be
manufactured and all stockpiles
destroyed. What guarantee has
Russia that the U. S. A. would
comply? How does he propose
to see it that we do? And
when, in the same breath, he
announces that the atomic bomb
is no secret and that other states
will have it, including the U. S.
5. r., how are we, for our part,
to know whether these are COM
plying?
A law that provides no in
struments for ascertaining
whether it is being observed, no
cou-ts to adjudicate it and no
punlshments for offenders, is
not law but a platitude. And
what Mr.. Viskinsky apparently
is recommending is the disarma
ment OF the U. S. A. only, not
the disarmament of the world,
including the U. S. S. r.
The whole world would like
to hear the Russians say exactly
now they propose to abolish war,
Exactly what would they prohi-
bit? Exactly how would they
ascertain infringements? Elk.
actly what do theY-augpose fol-
enforcement?
But let us, by all Means, stick
to this subject: It is either en-.
forceable law or international
anarchy. All other questions
are subsidiary.
(Reieased by The Bell Syndi
cate. Incl