Socialism, Capitalism

Alexander Cockburn overlooked a few facts in his otherwise excellent article on the achievements of socialism and the failures of capitalism (Column Left, Jan. 5). First, the economies of Africa and Latin America have not been capitalist, they have been socialist or mercantilist.

Second, the nations of Eastern Europe were not all “underdeveloped” before their conquest by socialism. East Germany and Czechoslovakia were as technologically advanced as any country in Western Europe. The Warsaw Pact states have been retarded, not advanced, by socialism. For its part, Russia, in 1914, was the world’s fifth largest producer of steel and was self-sufficient in food.

Third, when you kill or imprison a fourth of the population, as the Soviet Union did, it isn’t necessary to increase wealth. You only need to redistribute the wealth of the “enemies of the state” to achieve a 33% increase in the standard of living.

STEVE ROBERTS, Northridge