One of the major arguments of Soviet propaganda alleges that the Common Market is aggravating the contradictions of the capitalist world, and is precipitating a relentless struggle for position in the European market among rival monopolistic groups.

A strange argument indeed. What lies behind the growing interpenetration in the internal market of the Community, which has brought about an increase of 73 per cent in internal trade in four years, an increase of 19 per cent in the gross national product of the Community, and an increase of 29 per cent in industrial production? Does this look like a murderous struggle for position among monopolies? How can this argument be reconciled with the freely expressed aspirations of our European neighbours ... to join the Common Market or to be associated with it in one form or another?

The basic meaning of the attacks made against us is that the Soviet leaders have clearly recognised, albeit very late in the day, that something has happened, with unexpected speed and surprising success, which is absolutely impossible according to Marxist-Leninist theory. According to this theory capitalist states cannot overcome their differences and unite; such a union cannot create conditions for long-term economic planning covering large areas and ensuring stability and security in face of crises; these phenomena cannot be the forerunners of an economic system that might one day include the whole free world.

All this is impossible, in the Communist mind, not only for theoretical reasons, but for practical ones as well. It is impossible because the Eastern bloc has now reached a state of crisis in its economic evolution which is causing increasing anxiety among Soviet leaders. They are not only concerned with a crisis in the Soviet economy itself . . . they are also concerned, ironically, with a crisis of integration, as shown by the tortured, strained and insipid text of the latest Comecon resolution.