Page Eight
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Tuesday, June 8, 1976
Italian Communist attitudes questioned
ROME (+'4 - Italian Commu-
nist leaders, driving for a big
vote in crucial national elec-
tions, have been pledging loy-
alty to NATO and friendly ties
with the United States. But the
party's daily newspaper, ap-
parently catering to the anti-
West card - carrying faithful,
hasn't stopped hitting at "the
American imperialist system."
Party Secretary Enrico Ber-
linguer insists that Italian
Communists want no unilater-
al weakening of the North At-
lantic Treaty Organization. He
even commented at a meeting
of leftist intellectuals in May
that his search for a new Com-
munist model has led dogmatic
leaders in some Communist
countries to fear the possibility
of his party coming to power
after the June 20-21 elections.
LAST DECEMBER, when
there was little talk of parlia-
mentary elections a year ahead
of schedule, a headline in the
party organ Unita read- "The
nuclear bases of the United
States in Italy threaten secur-
ity and health."
U. S. officials look with dis-
favor on a Communist role in
the Italian government, and
both President Ford and U. S.
Secretary of State Henry Kis-
singer have said that if the
Communists enter the govern-
ment Washington will reassess
its relationship with Rome.
Many analysts believe the
Italian party's 1.7 million card-
carrying members trail far be-
hind their leaders in making
ideological room for Western
democratic liberties and the
military system that has been
built to defend them.
SOME SAY the Italian Com-
munist leaders are themselves
divided between the free West
and the Soviet Union and de-
liberately want to maintain a
certain ambiguity between the
blatantly pro-Soviet approach of
the past and the newly pro-
claimed one. This ambiguity
would provide greater room for
maneuvering on the interna-
tional scene.
On May 5, Unita said in a
front-page editorial by its for-
eign commentator Alberto Ja-
covielli:
"We have not concealed nor
do we intend to conceal that be-
tween the United States and
Italy there are problems to be
discussed. But we believe that
they can be discussed and solv-
ed in a spirit of friendship, mu-
tual respect and safeguarding
mutual sovereignty."
IN THE same issue on Page
3 Unita correspondent Guido Vi-
cario denounced the "imperial
order of the dollar in Latin
America" and described Cuban
military activities in Angola
as the "courageous policy of
anti - imperialistic solidarity."
In April, Sergio Segre, the
party's shadow foreign minis-
ter, told a conference on Italian
foreign affairs, "On the mili-
tary level the Italian Commu-
nist party wants Italy to re-
main in NATO . . . Detente has
become possible also thanks to
the balance of forces."
But Giovanni Berlinguer,
younger brother, of Eurico and
also a Communist deputy, told
a conference in December that
the U. S. support base for no-
clear submarines at La Madda-
lena in Sardinia "posed a
threat to the national sover-
eignty of Italy and to the pro-
cess of international detente."
UNITA described this as of-
ficial party policy. It said:
"This applies not only for La
Maddalena but also for Taran-
to, La Spezia. Naples and all
nuclear sites in Italy."
Giorgio Bocca, Socialist his-
torian and journalist, warns
against "taking as solid gold
the statements of Communist
leaders."
"ONE should never ignore
the composite structure of the
Communist party in Italy,"
Bocca said. Inside the party, he
added, "you can find every-
thing, from sincere democrats
to those who say any road is
good to get into the govern-
ment. Once in there, we will
take care of everything."
In Piombino, a Tyrrhenian
coastal town near Florence,
long ruled by Marxists, rank-
file Communists reacted vari-
ously to the illustration of the
party's stand on NATO and the
West by a central official re-
cently.
"Older Communists seemed
to react with a sense of disci-
pline but the young ones were
trying to capitalize on certain
ambiguities," a participant re-
ported. He added:
"AT A certain point, someone
raised the question: If the So-
viets invade Yugoslavia, what
will we do? Will we side with
the Russians or with the Amer-
icans? Except for a couple of
youths no one said he would
side with the Soviets. But there
was obviously confusion."
Stefano Silvestri, secretary
of the privately sponsored Ital-
ian Institute of Foreign Affairs,
said that in private talks Com-
munist leaders sometimes
sound even more pro-West than
in public statements, as if they
were keen to press home the
fact that they have to move
cautiously before their tradi-
tional supporters.
Silvestri, 34, said, "Ber-
linguer leaves some room for
hesitation and ambiguity be-
cause in my opinion he wants
to have elbow room."
GIUSEPPE ARE,an
analyst who was a Communist
until Soviet tanks crushed the
Hungarian uprising in 1956,
says he sees nothing more than
"symptoms" of profound ideo-
logical revision in the party's
foreign policy.
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Suit filed against ATT
for equipment monopoly
NEW YORK (MP) - Two sub-
sidiaries of Litton Industries
Inc. filed a $111 million anti-
trust suit yesterday charging
American Telephone & Tele-
graph Co. with monopolizing the
telephone terminal equipment
manufacturing market.
Under antitrust law, any dam-
ages awarded to Litton would be
tripled, equalling $333 million.
IN THE SUIT, filed in U.S.
District Court in Manahattan,
Litton charged it had been un-
able to compete in the making,
selling and distributing of var-
ious specialized telephone equip-
ment partly because of alleged
political payments and pressure
by AT&T aimed at state regula-
tory bodies.
The complaint did not specify
the dates such payments took
place or which state regulatory
agencies were involved. Litton
lawyers could not be reached
for comment.
The suit named as co-defen-
dants AT&T, Western Electric
Co. Inc., Bell Telephone Labora-
tories Inc., and seven AT&T
operating companies. It also
named 16 other Bell operating
companies an nondefendant co-
conspirators.
THE SUIT said the Federal
Communications Commission
ruled in 1968 that telephone cus-
tomers could connect their own
telyephone equipment to the Bell
System. Another FCC ruling last
March said AT&T's requirement
that telephone equipment made
by Bell's competitors could be
connected only after AT&T pro-
vided an interface device was
"unlawfully discriminatory."
Litton alleged in the suit that
the defendants had, through
their actions, illegally prevented
equipment field both before and
competition in the telephone
after the original 1968 FCC rul-
ing.
Litton said it and other com-
petitors of AT&T are being
forced out of the telephone
equipment business because of
the alleged monopolization.
THE SUIT claimed AT&T had
achieved a 98 per cent monopoly
of telephone terminal equipment
in U.S. markets.
Among other things, the suit
asked the federal court to order
AT&T to divest itself of any
"non-public utility business of
renting, leasing and selling tele-
phone terminal equipment ..
and to carry on the non-public
utility business as a separate
division."
In effect, the suit appeared to
call for the separation of such
manufacturing and research
arms as Western Electric and
Bell Laboratories from AT&T's
operating subeidiaries.
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