Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site charm.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!security!genrad!decvax!harpo!eagle!mhuxl!mhuxj!mhuxi!charm!tpkq
From: tpkq@charm.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Grenada
Message-ID: <151@charm.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-Nov-83 01:07:53 EST
Article-I.D.: charm.151
Posted: Tue Nov  1 01:07:53 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 4-Nov-83 00:01:54 EST
Organization: Physics Research - AT&T Bell Labs MH
Lines: 44

For those network readers interested in an alternative view of "our"
government's invasion of Grenada, here is an excerpt from an editorial in
an American socialist newspaper:

	"In the first such airborne invasion since Vietnam, nearly
2,000 U.S. Marines and Army Rangers stormed the tiny island of Grenada
October 25.  This naked and unprovoked aggression reveals the hatred
of the U.S. ruling class for the example Grenada set in 1979, when it
became the first Black country in the world to carry out a socialist
revolution.
	"As news of the criminal invasion spread, an outcry was heard
around the world.  Millions saw it as an ominous prelude to new U.S.
military intervention against Nicaragua, the Salvadoran liberation
fighters, and others struggling for freedom in the region.
	"The invasion of Grenada was preceded by the tragic
developments that led to the assassination of Grenadian Prime
Minister Maurice Bishop and many other top government leaders.  These
events have been deeply felt by workers in the United States,
especially Blacks.  The Grenadian people, like their sisters and
brothers in Cuba and Nicaragua, demonstrated that it is possible even
for a tiny, oppressed nation to throw off the racist, imperialist boot
of Washington, to take power from the hands of the capitalists and
landlords, and to establish a government that fights for the interests
of working people.
	"In 1979, the Grenadians overthrew Eric Gairy, a U.S.-backed
tyrant, and replaced him with a government of workers and farmers,
led by the New Jewel Movement.  That government, headed by Bishop,
mobilized the toiling masses for four and a half years to overcome the
legacy of poverty, hunger, and illiteracy left by centuries of
colonial and capitalist rule.
	"In the short time since 1979, the Grenadian government
slashed unemployment from 49 percent to less than 14 percent.
Thousands of acres of idle land were made available to small farmers.
	"Women were given equal rights, and a vast program of health
care, nutrition, adult education, and literacy classes was organized
to transform the lives of the Grenadian people.  Democratic councils
were established all over the island.
	"It was the refusal of the New Jewel leadership and Grenadian
people to retreat from their course that earned them the fear and
hatred of U.S. imperialism -- and the profound admiration of workers
all over the world. . ."

			-- from The Militant, a
			   U.S. socialist newsweekly