DEMONSTRATION AT MAYAKOVSKY'S MONUMENT .
_ The new ruling group of the Soviet bureaucracy must face, as. did Khrushchev, a radical opposition among the intellectuals who are bringing forward very advanced antibureaucratic demands, the politi-+ cal trend of which is at bottom quite clear. A notable demonstration was staged by this opposition last March on the anniversary of the death of Mayakovsky.
_ In 1961 and 1962, it will be recalled, thousands of youth in Moscow gathered around the monument to the poet to listen to the recitation of poems branded as tgubversive," that is, antibureaucra~ tic. Some of the most representative figures involved in the ‘gatherings were arrested and the demonstrations were banned by the political police,
This year several hundred youth gathered again. Most of them belonged to an unofficial (and semiclandestine) group known as SMOG
(Samoe Molodoe Obschestvo Geniev), a society of young engineers,
They began by reading poems dedicated to the memory of Mayakovsky, who is considered by all to have been an enemy of the bureaucrats who were the true cause of his death. At a certain point, one of the youth read a list of demands, addressed to the Writers Union, calling for the expulsion of certain members, those most compromised with Stalinism, who today head the most conservative circles in this organization, in particular Kotchetov, Gribatchov and Sofronov. The demand was also made (and this was most certainly the most interest~ing one) for the right to organize a_literary tendency of the left like the LEF of Mayakovsky in the twenties.
The youth assembled at the monument gave this long applause and decided to present these demands to the local of the Writers Union. When they went along the wide sidewalk of the Sadovoe Kiltzo in the direction of the local, their ranks grew considerably. At the same time, piainclothesmen of the political police mixed in with the crowd,
Near the Writers Union they ran into numerous squads of police, including a general of the militia, a rare occurrence. When they stopped to read the list of demands once more before going into the union local, a number of plainclothesmen seized the youth with the document and shoved him into a police car. A short scuffle occurred in which two more were arrested.
It is hardly necessary to stress the political significance and importance of the demand for the right to form a tendency. It is quite clear that the right to form a literary tendency in a situation like the one now existing in the Soviet Union would inevitably be immediately transformed into a demand for the right to forma political tendency. -This, together with the. fact..itself of the demonstration, which was not officially organized, explains the repression ordered by the bureaucrats who understand very well that such things can expand very rapidly and bring into question their privileges, their power, even their existence. They followed Khrushchev's way of reacting in similar situations. .
Among other things, the courage of the groups of vanguard youth should be noted. They know very well what the consequences of such actions can be. That is why, even in relation to 1961-62, the demands and the forms of struggle are more advanced. Before, action was limited to the reading of poems; the criticism of the bureaucracy was contained in the poems and was not made explicit in a’ document.
The passive opposition to the bureaucracy, which is very widespread among the youth, often takes the form of a rejection of politics. This is what the bureaucrats call "cynicism," and they are waging a fierce and desperate struggle against this "cynicism,"
But some of the means used in the struggle have proved rather dangerous at times to the bureaucrats -- this is particularly the case with the discussions organized against cynicism.
During May, the club of the physics students at the University of Moscow organized a discussion on the subject of "Cynicism and the Social Ideal." During the discussion, a young painter of the Novosti Agericy took the floor to declare- that the source of cynicism was primarily the politics of the Central Committee of the Communist party of the Soviet Union with all its zigzags carried out in the dark and without the least participation by the Soviet people. "And is there a worse cynicism," he said, "than that of protesting against putting a time limitation on the crimes of the Nazis while those responsible for the Stalinist crimes” are not only free but enjoying very high © state pensions?"
The young painter, warmly applauded by the audience, was soon arrested by the political police. He was later freed, it appears through the intervention of the central committee of the party. But a fow days later in a canteen, a dozen people surrounded him and engaged in a fight with him, When the. militia arrived, they claimed that they had been provoked and displayed as "proof" a long knife which they claimed they had taken away from the painter, He was , thus. condemned, not for a political crime, but for fighting and for carrying an illegal weapon. As Khrushchev said, there are no —politi-. cal prisoners in the USSR.
OPPOSITION