the main ideological and political weapon of imperialism. As indicated in the Program of the CPSU, its basic content is “. . . slander against the socialist system and falsification of the policies and goals of communist parties and of the teaching of Marxism-Leninism” (1961, pp. 51–52). At the foundation of anticommunism are slanderous assertions about the Utopian character of communist ideology, the “totalitarian” nature of socialist states, the essential aggressiveness of world communism, the “de-humanization” of social relations, and the “standardization” of thought and spiritual values under socialism. The most important part of anticommunism is anti-Sovietism, which is the effort to distort and belittle the achievements of the USSR in economics, politics, and culture. Anticom-munist propaganda utilizes all means of mass communication (press, radio, television, and so on) and is established at the level of national policy; its goals are to engender distrust toward the slogans and ideals of communists and to discredit the practice of socialism, thereby reducing the intensity of the revolutionary activity of the toilers and splitting their forces to ensure the maintenance of capitalist social relations. “With the false slogans of anticommunism, the reactionary forces of imperialism hunt and persecute everything that is progressive and revolutionary and attempt to split the ranks of toilers and to paralyze proletarians’ will to struggle. All the enemies of social progress have now united under this black banner: the financial oligarchy and military clique, fascists and reactionary clerics, colonialists and landlords, and all the ideological and political accomplices of reactionary imperialism. Anticommunism is a reflection of extreme degradation in bourgeois ideology” (ibid., p. 52).

Anticommunism is not only an ideology. It emerges as a real governmental activity directed at suppressing communist, workers’, and national liberation movements. When capitalist countries incline toward fascism and an offensive is waged against democratic forces, these phenomena begin with and are accompanied by frenzied anticommunism. Its extreme manifestation is the striving of aggressive imperialist circles toward war against socialist countries.

As distinguished from militant anticommunism—which is characterized by frank and vulgar negativism, links with pro-fascist elements, and extreme reactionary and warlike forces—certain exponents of bourgeois ideology have called for the creation of a so-called positive anticommunism. Acknowledging the scientific contributions of the founders of Marxism-Leninism to the development of social theory and the positive import of certain aspects of Marxism and the socialist society and proceeding from the “immanent” criticism of scientific communism, positive anticommunism attempts to demonstrate that Marxism-Leninism is obsolete and useless in solving the problems of a developed “industrial” society; it is oriented toward gradual internal regeneration, which means the “erosion” of communism. These false ideas are also propagated by right-wing social democratic elements; their anticommunism is one of the most important causes of their ideological and political crisis and is evidence of their capitulation to state monopoly capitalism.

A prominent role in anticommunism is allotted to so-called Sovietology, exponents of which include philosophers, economists, sociologists, theologians, and others, such as Iu. Bocheński (Switzerland), G. Wetter (the Vatican), A. Mayer and J. Fetcher (Federal Republic of Germany), and L. Schapiro (USA). Some Sovietologists proclaim the need for a deeper study of the theory and practice of communism in order to make the criticism of communism more “plausible” and refined.

Anticommunism permeates all aspects of the ideology and politics of contemporary capitalism. Anticommunism and anti-Sovietism make up the extreme right wing of the ideology and politics of the bourgeoisie today; they are a manifestation of a reaction based on the deliberate distortion of the theory and practice of scientific communism. A different political tendency is represented by the views and conceptions of those ideologists who, while criticizing various aspects of the socialist way of life or disagreeing with the principles of communism, do not use slander, falsification, and dem-agoguery. Accordingly, while communists mercilessly denounce the falsifiers, they polemicize persuasively and cogently against people who are prepared to conduct a serious discussion.