WHY TITO WALKED OUT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-01416R000100030184-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 23, 1998
• Sequence Number: 184
• Publication Date: April 27, 1952
• Content Type: NSPR

i ?
Approved For Release 1999/09/07 : CIA-RDP78-01416R000100030184-7
"Why Tito W01W4
TITOISM AND THE COMINPORM.
By Adam B. Ulam. 243 pp. Cam-
bridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press. $4.
By PHILIP E. MOSELY
A 31 r years a er e
ejection of the Communist
party of Yugoslavia from the
Soviet-led Cominform, the ori-
gins and consequences of this
striking event are still obscure
at many points. Did the break
arise from the obtuseness of So-
'i P)ORGHTts and their fail-
ure to appraise correctly the
inner cohesiveness of the Com-
munist party of Yugoslavia?
Or was it an "inevitable" result
of the attainment of power by
a Communist party through its
own efforts and without decisive
aid from the Soviet regime?
On the basis of much recently
published material, including
the resolutions of the C. P. Y.
up to 1937 and Tito's appoint-
ment as Secretary General, as
well as newspapers and peri-
odicals published in Yugoslavia,
Bulgaria and Poland, Adam B.
Ulam has made an acute analy-
sis of the scattered evidence.
His account is an essential con-
tribution to an understanding
of Titoism as a political fact
and a valuable supplement to
H. F. Armstrong's "Tito and
Goliath."
But 1s it possible to give a
eally adequate explanation of
he Yugoslav - Soviet dispute
hale sticking closely to pub-
ished sources, naturally pre-
erred by the scholar? In a
ealistic interpretation, specula-
ion, labeled as speculation, has
place. Avoidance of specula-
ion is itself a speculation that
he printed information is both
dequate and balanced.
Very little is known about the
teps which led to the creation
f the Cominform, in Septem-
er, 1947, and, as noted by Mr.
lam, a member of the Rus-
ien Research Center at Har-
I. Mr. Mosely, a member of the
ussian Institute of Columbia
niversity, studied village life
pre-war Yugoslavia and has
visited that counttry several
mess s since the war.
_,(, Y2
-7 -;7 r-
1 _ f THE
var the Yugoslav spokes-
men have avoided raising the
curtain on this crucial series of
decisions. It is probable, how-
.ever, that the primary ur
in establishing it was not to
E ffset the attractions of the
arshall Plan and to strengthen
e ign
policies of the satellites but,
more fundamentally, to speed
up the transition from the stage
of political coalitions and mixed
systems of economy to that of
complete integration into the
economic and military potential
of the Soviet regime. To be
ready for the "next round" the
Soviet leaders wanted to con-
solidate Communist control
within each satellite state and
Soviet control over each satel-
lite party.
AGAIN, is it realistic to ig-
nore almost completely the in-
terplay between Soviet-Yugo-
slav frictions and Soviet-bloc
policies toward the civil war in
Greece, even though the pub-
lished sources are extremely
reticent on this subject? The
Bled agreement of August, 1947,
between Tito and Dimitrov
hardly made sense unless it
made detailed provision for a
coordinated policy in Greece.
It is probable that the Bled
agreement provided or assumed
the eventual annexation of
Greek Macedonia by Yugoslavia
and of Greek Thrace by Bul-
garia.; otherwise it is hard to
understand why Dimitrov Was
willing to promise Bulgarian
Macedonia to Yugoslavia. The
proclamation of Vafiades' "Free
Greek" Government, in Decem-
ber, 1947, and the Soviet absten-
tion from recognition of it, may
have marked the turning-point
in Moscow's decision to tighten
the reins on Yugoslav ambi-
tions.
This, rather than Dimitrov's
vague endorsement of a Balkan
federation, may have been the
origin of the Kremlin's warning
to the Balkan Communists, in
late January, 1948, to work
harder at. Socialist reconstruc-
tion within their own countries
1Continued on Page 331
NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
cP- Tito
Walked Out
(Continued from Page 6)
and to dream less of a Balkan
unjon.
While Mr. Ulam refers to the
last-gasp promise of the "Free
Greek" Government, in April,
1949, to work for the creation
of a "Greater Macedonia" (at
Greece's expense), he fails to
point out that by then Vafiades
had been removed by pro-Mos-
covite elements and that now
the promise of a "Free Mace-
donia" was being used against
Tito, whereas in 1947-48 it had
been used by him to support the
claims of Yugoslav Macedonia.
Mr. Ulam's account shows
rather frequently a certain re-
moteness from the Yugoslav
scene. He assumes, for example,
that in 1941-45 the numerous
political commissars assigned to
Partisan units were not en-
gaged in active fighting; as a
matter of fact, casualties were
extremely high among them
since under guerrilla conditions
political and military leadership
were inseparable,
Mr. Ulam accepts at face-
value the present "non-expan-
sionist" phase of Yugoslav na-
tionalism. A closer study of in-
ternal Yugoslav sources would
suggest that, while claims to
Salonica and Trieste are quies-
cent in the diplomatic field,
they have not been abandoned
as a major theme of internal
propaganda.
His account of the domestic
policies of Yugoslavia since 1948
is sketchy and over-simplified.
Contradictory aims which in-
fluence relations between the
governing party and the gov-
erned, as well as the interplay
of interest groups within the
party, are more complex in
heir implications than Mr.
r
l?-= appears to assume.
I. r.