861.00/11–145: Airgram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Harriman) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 7—9:06 a.m.]
A–316. The slogans of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party for the 28th Anniversary of the October Revolution were published on the front pages of the Moscow newspapers for October 28.95
The content of the slogans and the order of their publication were substantially similar to those appearing during the war, with the [Page 914] exception of appeals to front line troops, which were omitted. As usual, slogans given priority and emphasis were those to the Soviet armed forces and to “the great Soviet people, which has won victory over the German-fascist and Japanese imperialists”.
The major differences between the October and May slogans are the omission of any mention of the “Anglo-Soviet-American Alliance”, which was greeted in May Day slogan No. 6, and the substitution of the theme of success in socialist construction in the final slogan for that of increasing the “military-economic might” of the country. The “people” of the Allied countries are greeted in slogans 6 and 7, as allies of the USSR in defeating the German and Japanese “aggressors”, respectively. The total number of slogans lauding foreign countries or peoples was reduced from nine (No. 6–14, inclusive) to three (No. 6–8, inclusive). One of the groups of foreign countries applauded in the slogans for the October Revolution Anniversary consists of Italy and other former German satellites. These countries are praised for having broken with the Hitlerites.
Emphasis upon vigilance in guarding the security of the Soviet Union from external attack is marked by slogans 5 and 12, addressed respectively to Red Army and Navy forces abroad and by slogans 9 and 10, expressing determination to prevent unnamed “aggressive countries” from disturbing peace and urging vigilance in preserving the peace which has been achieved.
The themes of reconstruction and consumers goods receive only slightly more emphasis than in the May Day slogans.
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To compare with the slogans for the XXVII anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution of October 25/November 7, 1917, see telegram 4197, November 2, 1944, from Moscow, Foreign Relations, 1944, vol. iv, p. 926.
For text of President Truman’s telegram of November 6, sent at 9:45 a.m., to Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin, Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the Soviet Union, on the occasion of the XXVIII anniversary of the October (Bolshevik) revolution, see Department of State Bulletin, November 11, 1945, p. 768.
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