Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1957-07-09
Mythical 'MonoIith'

~ANSS~1'
ganovich seem now to be in danger of
being tried" and executed in the man.
ner made famous, or infamous, by the
late Generalissimo Stain. But whether
this is to be their fate or not, and may
be they will escape it, the mere fact of
their sudden downfall serves to remind
the world of one of the very great weak
nesses inherent in the Kremlin's gov
erning system.
OF course, Moscow's propagandists
are still telling us, as they have been
telling us for decades past, that the
Soviet Communist Party, the Soviet
government and the Soviet masses all
constitute together mighty "monolith"
Of absolutely unbreakable and indie
Structible unity and power-ideologica
political, social, economic and military.
In actually, however, no monolith could
be more palpably mythical. For it has
been thing full of immense cracks
from top to bottom ever since the Krem-
lin first began Boosting about it, more
or less in the manner of man who doth
protest too much about his strength or
innocence.
Certainly, as Nikita Khrushchev
, himself has proclaimed, there was moth
ing monolithic about the USSR during
Stalin's long reign of terror. Instead,
there was only system of almost pSy-
chopathic one-man tyranny under which
the secret police, the torture chamber,
the whip, the truncheon, the gun and
the gallows were endleSsly employed,
without mercy or letup, to repress and
liquidate diSSident elements both within
the Communist Party and within the
great mass of the people. And now,
after little more than four years of post
Stain rule under the "monolithic" sys-
tenn of collective leadership" we see
that leadership fallen apart before our
eyes, with some of its key members fac
ing the possibility, if not the probability,
of being physically destroyed by bullet
In the head or rope around the neck.
Thus the "monolith." What it really
Is, OF course, is deSpotism that makes
almost inevitable constant struggle for
personal power among the Supremely
ambitious men who vie against each
other at the top level of commando
kind of internecine war in which even
the formidable Mr.. KhruShchev may yet
fall. This is so because there is no gen.
pine political legitimacy in the Soviet
Union, no hereditary or legal forms of
succession from one ruler to the next,
no democratic ascent to top leadership
I on the basis of the voting consent Of
the governed. In that sense, all that
prevails over there is the law of survival
of the f1ttest, the law of rivals shooting
down each other for mastery of the
gang, all in the name of twisted ide-
ology and make-believe "monolithic"
unity
According to Mr. Khrushchev, all
this goes on in keeping with the "holy"
laws of Marxism-Leninism. But the
truth is that it goes on only because the
collective leaders" in such system feel
impelled to eliminate each other. Ac-
cordingly, although the Kremlin is I'M
queStionably strong in arms, this basic
dilemma in its governing setup, together
with the grave and justified discomfort
existing among the Russian and satellite
peoples, represents a major deficiency
that ought not to be underestimate
To be sure, neither should this def
cheney be overestimated Yet, with that
said, the fact still remains that the So
Wet "monolith' is gigantic fake which
the free world needs to keep always in
mind as it measures It's own relative
weakness and its own relative strength.
Show of Common Sense