pA full realization of the great significance of our achievements is necessary but it is equally imperative to be perfectly clear about what stage our socialist construction is now in and what key problems need solving at this juncture to get to socialism. More than anyone else, trade union cadres and all politically conscious workers must ask themselves that question, must ponder over it. There must be full realization that the working class as the ruling class, as the leading class of the State, is the vanguard class in the transformation of the old society and in the moulding of a new society. As a result, the conditions of trade union work have radically changed. If one of trade unionism’s principal functions is to 103uphold the interests of the working class, its supreme and most basic interest once that class has taken power is to successfully build socialism. The trade unions must drive this home to all their members, to all toilers, in order to instil in them the sense of responsibility, as collective master, for all happenings in our society, a personal interest in, and the habit of pondering over, every important and burning issue which may arise in the course of the shaping of a new society.
pIt is obvious that we have recorded great achievements, but there is still much room for dissatisfaction in many respects, most particularly in our economic situation. We must not be complacent, and we are still far from having any grounds for complacency, about what we have accomplished. It could have been more if it had not been for our mistakes and shortcomings. We will be even less complacent if we check our results against the noble objectives of socialism.
pLooked at from this angle, the North’s economy faces great difficulties and problems requiring radical solutions. There is a lot to be done immediately and urgently. Otherwise it will be impossible even to inch forward on the road to socialism. Otherwise even what are called the initial fruits of socialism will be in jeopardy.
pWe do not hesitate to speak of our difficulties. If we want to advance, we must realize them all in order to surmount them; we must be aware of all our problems, of all our tasks. As a matter of fact, building socialism is never and nowhere an easy job. Even in normal conditions, that is, when material prerequisites have been prepared by developed capitalism, free from war and aggression, such an undertaking is by no means plain sailing, let alone in our special situation where the stage of capitalist development must be by-passed, and the economy has been heavily damaged by the war of aggression and destruction.
pWith the highest level possible of military deployment against our country, with millions of tons of bombs and shells, the U.S. imperialists destroyed nearly all the economic structures our people had built at the cost of a tremendous amount of energy. Without the war, the North would have been in much better shape economically. The war has rolled back our originally underdeveloped 104economy, which had just made a step forward, to where it was more than ten years ago. Apart from material damage estimated at many billion dong, other after-effects will take a rather long time to overcome.
pWhen recalling these problems we do not entertain any feeling of regret. No, we never feel any regret over the price of independence and freedom. For our nation, our class, and for each of us, independence and freedom are priceless. Our view about it has been expressed by President Ho Chi Minh: "Hanoi, Haiphong and other cities may be flattened, but this prospect will not cow us into submission. Nothing is more precious than independence and freedom. When the battle is won, we shall rebuild our country into a better, bigger and more beautiful one.”
pNearly a century of colonial domination has caused our people to realize clearly what independence and freedom really mean to them. Socialism, this truth of our times, has brought out in bolder relief the fact that independence and freedom are invaluable. Now that peace has been restored in the North, we must seize the opportunity and give a big boost to our construction, thereby raising our economic and national defence potential and making our country sufficiently strong to preserve peace, and force our adversary to fully and strictly implement the Paris Agreement, which is the dearest wish of our entire people. If the enemy should fail to learn the lesson, which is still fresh, and starts a new war of destruction against the North, we must be instantly ready to make every sacrifice, and "with hammer or plough in one hand, and rifle in the other,” to confront and crush the aggressor. In construction and combat alike, our only motive is to defend independence and freedom.
pOur present most important daily task here in the North is to build. It is precisely because of this that we must know every aspect of our present economic situation well, be aware of all our difficulties and of their causes, if they are to be overcome.
pThe great, varied and ever increasing requirements which are placed on our economy, which is poor and unbalanced in nature, and whose problems have been compounded by our mistakes and shortcomings in leadership, guidance and management, only 105highlight its imbalance and fundamental weaknesses.
pOur social labour force is considerable but it is not made full use of, and its productivity is still very low. The state apparatus, particularly administrative bodies, non-productive organs, have swollen excessively in recent years. Salaries and similar expenditures have outstripped the possibilities of the economy. Moreover, a population explosion (a ten-million rise from 1954 to 1973) has worsened the lack of equilibrium between the multiple needs of life and our present financial and economic resources. Agricultural production is still unstable and very uneven, unable to meet the people’s needs in foodstuffs, in raw materials for industry, in export products. In industry most of the important factories were destroyed during the war and while a large number of them have been rehabilitated, production has not been brought back to normal. Life has been restored only to a small degree of normalcy, the supply of food still falls short of plans, many consumer goods are still not available. Due to a low level of production, a population explosion, a low national income which does not meet adequately the needs of consumption, we cannot yet ensure a balance between imports and exports. In short, the outstanding feature of the North’s present economic situation is that social labour and economic potential are not made the most of, while social production is still very low, domestic capital accumulation absent, and the life of the masses still hard.
pThe root cause of such a situation lies in the fact that there are mistakes, shortcomings and immaturity in our economic leadership, guidance and management. There have certainly been serious mistakes which we must severely criticise and resolutely make good.
pHowever, to get to the root of the problem, we must ask ourselves this question: if we had made no mistakes at all, how good would the situation have been? Naturally, it would have been better, and, in some respects and in some places, far better. But our poverty and backwardness would not have been basically done away with. For, starting from a very low level, the North has been engaged in socialist construction for less the 20 years—12 of which were taken up by the war and only eight of which were really 106devoted to construction—and, as pointed out above, our severe losses have substantially impeded our progress.
pThen, what is the crux of the matter now? It is the fact that we are still in an abnormal, unnatural position. We are building socialism, but a small-scale, basically agricultural economy still prevails. There are new relations of production, but we cannot yet say that we have a socialist mode of production. So we may say we do have and at the same time do not have full socialism. There lies the paradox of our development. All things considered, the crux of the matter is that we have not been able to lay the material and technical foundations of socialism. While these are lacking, nothing else can survive and develop normally, naturally. Thus, many difficulties are inevitable. As we all know, capitalism in its manufacturing stage could not be said to be viable because, as Marx explained, "it had not acquired a material framework independent of the worker himself.” Only when machines were invented could it secure such a framework. "Capitalism could in the end stand on its feet only thanks to the economic force of things."(2) Capitalism could not survive in the context of handicrafts, let alone socialism.
pTherefore we are faced with a grave choice: either rapidly create the "material framework" of socialism or keep whatever new things have been engendered by socialism in a permanent state of debility and instability. Either move quickly forward, or reverse back to individual production, bankruptcy and destitution.
pThere is only one course of action to choose: give a strong impulse to socialist industrialization, advance quickly to large-scale socialist production. This was the basic objective of the resolutions of the 19th, 20th and particularly the 22nd sessions of the Party Central Committee. These dealt with many facets of economic construction and development, of economic leadership and management. But all aspects were geared in the discussions to the implementation of the central task, i.e., to develop socialist industrialization and rapidly take the North to large-scale socialist production. They were all geared to the satisfaction of the central requirement, i.e., to vigorously expand the forces of production and concurrently to consolidate and constantly perfect socialist 107relations of production.
To develop the forces of production, we must rely on the new relations of production, which must be readjusted and consolidated, and whose superiority must be brought into play. Any farming or handicraft co-operative which works badly or whose members have "one foot in and the other out" must be promptly and resolutely set right, otherwise its production and productivity cannot be raised. On the other hand we must regard the all-out development of the forces of production as the basic method to consolidate and perfect the new relations of production. Clearly, the new relations of production have not been consolidated (in the state-owned sector or in the collective sector, but chiefly in the collective sector). This is due to many causes. So a series of measures must be undertaken simultaneously. But all things considered, the development of the forces of production remains the most decisive means to consolidate and perfect the new relations of production. And to this effect, socialist industrialization must be impelled forward, and the whole economy must be shifted to largescale socialist production.
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