First Published: The Call, Vol. 7, No. 6, February 13, 1978.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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The class struggle in Norway is gathering steam. On all fronts, the workers, students, peasants, fishermen, women and even children have been launching campaigns of militant struggle for their democratic rights, against the war preparations of the two superpowers and for socialism.
Many of the struggles benefit from the revolutionary leadership of the Workers Communist Party (AKPML) of Norway. This party, which will celebrate its fifth anniversary in February, was born in the struggle against modern revisionism and has become the vanguard party of the Norwegian working class.
Klassekampen (Class Struggle), the daily newspaper of the AKPML, gives a good idea of the broad sweep of the workers’ movement in Norway. The newspaper covers the day-to-day struggle in factories all over the country—both those owned by Norwegian monopoly capitalists and others, such as IBM and Ford Steel, where the Norwegian Workers are exploited by U.S. imperialists.
While Norway is deeply penetrated by U.S. economic interests and is part of the NATO alliance, it is also directly threatened by Soviet aggression and expansionism. Recently, Klassekampen has reported on numerous violations of Norway’s sovereignty by the Soviet social-imperialists.
In Norway’s Svalbard islands, for example, the USSR has openly seized and occupied territory, using it as a staging area for reconnaissance flights, electronic spying, satellite tracking and aircraft refueling.
The imperialist occupation has aroused enormous anger among the Norwegian people, as has the reluctance of the government to do anything about it. Several major demonstrations, initiated by the Marxist-Leninists, have been held to demand that the Soviets get out of Norwegian territory, and also that Soviet ships stop plundering the Norwegian fishing grounds.
The Norwegian people have a long memory. They were occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II and waged a heroic people’s war against the Hitlerites. They are coming to see many parallels between the behavior of the USSR towards their country and that of Hitler Germany.
The AKPML has therefore advanced a program of preparing to wage a protracted national people’s war should their country be attacked by the social-imperialists. They have called on sections of the Norwegian people to heighten their awareness of the moves of both superpowers and especially the aggressive and expansionist actions of the USSR against their country.
While condemning the activities of the two superpowers, the AKPML has also actively built solidarity with the struggles of the third world countries and the liberation movements fighting imperialism. The Party helped to organize a very successful fundraising tour for the Azanian Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) and recently, through the Norwegian Palestine Support Committee, a team of medical workers was sent to PLO guerrilla bases in the Mideast.
The AKPML firmly supports the new victories won in socialist China. In 1977, Party Chairman Pal Steigan met with Chairman Hua Kuo-feng of the Chinese Communist Party in Peking expressing support for the Chinese people’s great victory over the “gang of four.”
A joint declaration between AKPML and the CPML of the U.S. was published in June 1977. In it, both parties declared their solidarity and fraternal ties based on proletarian internationalism and Marxist-Leninist principles.
On the domestic front, the Norwegian workers are fighting against the severe economic crisis which is afflicting the country. Their fightback is against joblessness, especially among the youth, against the falling prices of agricultural products, against wage ceilings and speedup and against the collaboration of Norway’s leading labor bureaucrats and the revisionist partners in these crisis measures.
Women are playing an active role in the fightback movement. The mass organization Kvinnefront (Women’s Front), led by the AKPML, has exposed the social as well as economic and political effects which the present crisis is having upon Norwegian women.
In all these fights, the Workers Communist Party actively works to unite and politically educate the people. The Party maintains a large number of bookstores, study circles and schools throughout the country, where working people can learn the science of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought.
Klassekampen is more widely read than the newspapers of either of Norway’s two revisionist parties. It has steadily increased its circulation among Norwegian workers and was able to become a daily last year.
Preparations are now underway for festive celebration of the Party’s fifth anniversary on Feb. 18. A mass rally will be held in Oslo, featuring revolutionar cultural events and speeches summing up the history of the Party.