On October 8, Peru's president, Belaunde Terry was overthrown in a

bloodless militarily coup by pro-nationalist" officers angered by his

refusal to nationalize Standard Oil's International Petroleum Company.

The military then seized the I.P.C. holdings and demanded from the

United States $1 billion worth of profits taken from the country by the

I. P. C. over the past 40 years.

Behind the move lies the fact of more than four decades of robbery by

Rockefeller's Standard Oil. The oilfields which the militarists have

recently moved to nationalize were grabbed off by Standard in the 1920.

In the years following, Rockefeller acquired title to 135,000 acres of

choice Peruvian land in the name of the Cerro de Pasco Corporation, and

in 1964, through the agency of Chase-Manhattan Bank, bought up the

38-branch Banco Continental of Peru. Subsoil rights to the oil-bearing

area of Peru were originally held by British capitalists who acquired

them from a corrupt government in violation of a law prohibiting the

alienation of such rights from the nation. Title was transferred to an

English-owned company in Canada, International Petroleum, whose stock

was later bought up by Standard Oil of New Jersey.

Once before, in 1963, the Peruvian Congress moved to nationalize the

oilfields but retreated when the British government, on the grounds that

it had been party to the original award, and the Canadian government, on

the ground that the company was "Canadian", resisted nationalization.

With Britain and Canada ready and willing to run interference for the

Yankee billionaires the United States government was able to remain

discretely in the background, stating only that they would accept

any settlement satisfactory to the company. Now Washington finds it

necessary to take direct charge, claiming that the Canadian

incorporation of the company is meaningless, that the United States is

the aggrieved party.

(This is an interesting development in view of the claim advanced in

some quarters that Canada is an imperialist country in her own right

because some U. S. -owned subsidiaries handle a certain amount of

overseas investments from here. When a push comes to shove, the Yankees

are quick to show who is the real boss of the show.)

When Belaunde Terry made some quite modest demands on Standard and other

interests, amounting to no more than a request for payment of back

taxes, the United States, aided by Britain, put pressure on his

government. Belaunde finally capitulated to the pressure and exonerated

the company completely from paying any back debts to Peru.

Just as in all Latin American countries, living conditions for the

Peruvian working people are absolutely deplorable. Unemployment,

starvation, "homes" constructed of cardboard and tin, tens of thousands

of sick and hungry people huddled into the poverty ghettoes known as

"barrios", than rim the cities like Lima, and landless peasants who own

not even a patch of soil on which to grow a few vegetables, even as

Yankee land-grabbers carve out virtual kingdoms for themselves. The

already unbelievably horrible conditions of the people grow daily worse

while a few foreign investors reap untold wealth from the tortured land.

A relative handful of traitor puppets have been content to sell-out the

country's natural resource and act as overseers and hangmen for U. S.

imperialists. The payments made to this traitor class are invested

abroad, against the day when they will have to flee the wrath of the

people.

Resentment against these conditions, arising from foreign domination and

exploitation, has been intensifying over the years to the point where

workers and peasants have mounted sharp struggle against the imperialist

exploiters and the regime of national betrayal. The only response of the

imperialists to date has been a demand for more repressive measures and

an increase of taxes on the Peruvian people to provide still move

facilities for the exploiters and to pay the expenses of the state

bureaucracy.

Given the conditions that exist in Peru it is inevitable that the middle

class and the lower ranks of the national bourgeoisie would be squeezed

economically and become resentful toward the regime, particularly since

they are not allowed a share of the profits of national betrayal. These

groups entertain desires to transform the administration into one that

more closely represents their class interests. Out they carefully avoid

mobilization of the masses and revolution. Rather than chance an appeal

to the working people, they will seek means to achieve their ends by

"peaceful and orderly methods" if the opportunity should present itself.

And in Peru the opportunity did, indeed, come to hand.

The officer corp of the armed forces is manned mainly by members of

those dissatisfied elements and when the crisis in the semicolonial

economy becomes sharp enough they tend to side with the class group from

which they sprang--especially if there appears to be real hope of

success. In Peru conditions were ripe for this type of action and the

army was able to organize a coup that completely avoided any appeal to

the mass of the people.

Instead, the militarists use the visit of some Russian warships and

hastily-signed trade agreements with Russia's eastern European colonies

to try to bolster their image of "national independence" from U. S.

imperialism. But without a mass base the army administration cannot

last. "The internal contradictions that tear apart the various elements

that support the dictatorship will cause it to break up from within, and

U. S. pressure front without--including armed intervention if deemed

necessary--will hasten the development of the internal factors. The army

administration will quite soon be confronted with the choice of

mobilizing the masses for revolutionary anti-imperialist resistance, or

of coming to terms with the foreign exploiters, which will mean

capitulation.

Being exploiters themselves, and panic-stricken at the idea of armed

revolution, it is a foregone conclusion that this administration as

presently constituted, will choose the path of capitulation to the

imperialists. The fight for national independence in Peru will make real

advances only when the working people take over the leadership of the

anti-imperialist forces.