Western European Communism

Report Outline
Concern Over New Party Directions
Failure of Communists in Portugal
Emergence of European Communism
Alternatives for Western Communists
Special Focus

Concern Over New Party Directions

Fears in Both Soviet Union and United States

The concerted efforts of the Communist parties of Western Europe to attain power peacefully through the electoral process may become one of the major political dramas of the 1970s. Many Western European Communists profess the benign nature of their Marxism and assert their independence from the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, their actions hold promises and threats for both Moscow and Washington. The United States fears the prospect of Communists gaining control of the governments of longtime North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) allies. The Soviet Union fears the development of independent and liberalized Communist parties that could strongly influence discontented Soviet satellite governments in Eastern Europe.

Two elections in the days and months ahead could tell much about the future trend of communism in Western Europe. On April 25, in Portugal's first national legislative elections in nearly 50 years, the Communists are expected to fare badly because of general disapproval of their efforts last fall to create a revolutionary state by force (See p. 288). But in Italy, where the governing Christian Democratic Party probably will resign soon and is expected to call for elections in June, the Communists easily could become the largest party in the government (see p. 299).

If the Russians feel threatened by a communism that is democratic, the United States feels threatened by a Europe that could turn Marxist. Speaking to the American Society of Newspaper Editors in Washington, D.C., on April 13, Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger said: “I believe the advent of Communists in Western European countries is likely to produce a sequence of events in which other European countries will also be tempted to move in the same direction.” This enunciation of what is, in effect, a “domino theory” for Europe was among Kissinger's most forceful statements yet on the dangers he sees for the Atlantic alliance.