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From: oaf@mit-vax.UUCP (Oded Feingold)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: What's So Unthinkable About Slave Labor??
Message-ID: <380@mit-vax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 6-Mar-86 15:18:30 EST
Article-I.D.: mit-vax.380
Posted: Thu Mar  6 15:18:30 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Mar-86 21:21:30 EST
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 69

>>  	[Ron Rizzo referring to my mention that zek labor built the 
>>  	Soviet end of the Siberian-European gas pipeline.
		    ------------------------------
 >   I have this nasty feeling as I read this that you must be joking,
 >and I have missed all of the :-).  If this was a joke and I missed the
 >point feel free to flame at me for my stupidity...
				[David desJardins]

>   No evidence here, just unsupported speculation by ardent anti-Soviets.
		    ------------------------------
    In this case including Andrei Sakharov.  Does he have a history of lying,
or showing disrespect for the truth?

 >   And we all know that if those nasty Communists say one thing the
 >opposite must be true...
		    ------------------------------
    A telling point.

>>	In "The First Guidebook to U.S.S.R. Prisons and Concentration
>>	Camps," Avraham Shifrin superimposed the pipeline route with
>>	wonderful precision on a map of the camps.  [ 141 ]

 >   So at last we have the evidence.  Did he happen by any chance to
 >superimpose either of these with railroad maps?  I'll bet they match
 >with "wonderful precision."  Or does the fact that the camps are near
 >the rail lines mean that the prisoners were forced to build those too? :-)
		    ------------------------------
	It doesn't MEAN it.  But isn't it likely anyway?

    I am mystified that Mr. desJardins belittles the topic  with  cute
debater's tricks.  Does he seriously doubt the allegations?  Must they
be proven "beyond a reasonable doubt" in a  court  of  law?   Evidence
ranging from Solzhenitsyn's works, to reports by Amnesty International
and other human-rights organizations, to stratments  of  ex-prisoners,
to  Soviet military SIOPs (which include punishment battalions of zeks
qto be forced into battle,  with  KGB  forces  riding  herd  on  them)
support  systematic  Soviet  use  of  slave labor on various projects,
including major items of national development.  Is  this  one  somehow
magically different?

    Why such sneering superiority?  If you debate Ron  Rizzo,  do  you
need  to  prove he's screwed up on every point, truth be damned?  Must
you stake your ego (and argument) on a reversal of longstanding Soviet
domestic policy?

    It seems natural to believe the USSR uses slave labor wherever  it
can,  including on the pipeline.  It's a side issue from the viewpoint
of arms control, but not when we model ideal societies.  I don't  feel
a  need  to "prove" such specifics to people emotionally involved with
believing the opposite.  Patterns of  behavior  and  close  precedents
suffice.   That's not ideological - there are nations and regimes with
recent histories of cruel behavior, left and right.  That's  no  great
revelation.
    (Admittedly,  if  someone  accused  the  Swedish   government   of
deliberate  brutality  as  national  policy, I'd want to see extensive
evidence, since it flies in the face of all  other  information  about
that  country.   But  is  it  difficult to believe nasty things happen
routinely in South Africa, Paraguay, even the USSR?  If you were  told
that  Indonesian troops slaughter Timorese, would it amaze you?  Would
you require proof before giving the report any credence?)

    I  suspect  you  wrote  your message merely to make Ron Rizzo feel
like shit.  If that's important to you, go right  ahead,  little  boy.

	    But don't call it debating - merely baiting.
-- 
----------
Oded Feingold     MIT AI Lab.   545 Tech Square    Cambridge, Mass. 02139
OAF%OZ@MIT-MC.ARPA   {harvard, ihnp4!mit-eddie}!mit-vax!oaf  617-253-8598