Clashing interests in the Mediterranean. (1939)

From the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

To every other nation except Italy, the Mediterranean is a means, to Italy it is an end.

During the Ethiopian campaign the massing of the British Navy, to the surprise of everybody, failed to scare Mussolini, or to prevent Italy from using the “all-red route" for her Abyssinian war. The British fleet, under threat of hostilities with an air power, slipped out of Malta in search of a safer base.

The complacency of years was shattered, and the ruling class of Britain, caught by surprise, was forced into hasty thinking.

Elizabeth Monroe, in her book, “The Mediterranean in Politics,” sheds an enlightening gleam upon those hectic days. “If Malta was insecure in face of air armaments, were all small fortresses out of date, and, if so, what about Gibraltar, Cyprus, Aden? . . . Would not the Government do better to concentrate its money and energy on the securer passage round the Cape?”

There was confusion everywhere in the councils of our masters: strategists and experts expressed conflicting views. Some were for quitting the Mediterranean. Others pointed out that to quit was to weaken Britain's position, because it reduced her power of attack.

“In the World War, when the enemy had boasted few or no Mediterranean bases, German submarines had been more successful in the Mediterranean than in any other sea. Five out of thirteen million tons of allied and neutral shipping sunk by submarine had been caught somewhere between Gibraltar and Port Said."

The other side disagreed. They admitted that the route was impassable for merchant shipping in time of war, but they held that the despised bases had their uses. They might be open to attack, but they could also hit back. Blockade from Aden and Gibraltar was no substitute for attack, because a Mediterranean enemy—for instance, Italy or Turkey—could prosper within the blockade area, since she could procure there all essentials except rubber and tin. She could get plentiful wheat and meat and dairy produce from the Balkans, coal from Russia or Germany, oil from Russia, Rumania or Iraq, iron ore from French North Africa, Russia or Spain, copper from Russia, Yugoslavia or Cyprus, and cotton from Russia or Egypt. Obviously, some of these powers might join in the blockade, but Great Britain was far less likely to retain allies if she had retired to a distance. Italy, for example, would be in a position to browbeat her small neighbours into supplying her needs if there were no one left to dispute her local supremacy.

“We are quitting nothing," said the Secretary of State for the Colonies. “Far from there being any question of our abdicating our position in the Mediterranean or scuttling from Malta, we intend to face these new and difficult problems—to make our future position secure," said the First Lord of the Admiralty, after visiting Malta and Cyprus.

The result was that the ruling class drew up an armament programme staggering in its immensity and cost.

Mussolini, however, was in no way daunted; he knows the weakness as well as the strength of his opponents; he has a view of life totally different to that of his democratic antagonists, he cannot be bluffed.

The dictator’s pet aversion is said to be Eden; the latter personifies everything that Mussolini loathes—bourgeois respectability.

If there is any particular type the Duce admires it is the efficient proletarian. Mussolini has lived as a vagrant and knows from experience how hard is the lot of the wage slave; his early writings gave us a glimpse of his mind: when approached in the wrong way, his fury is immediately aroused, especially if there is anything in the manner of those who seek contact with him that recalls his bitter past. Read this and you can form an opinion of what he may have thought of the smug Anthony: the latter, probably, reminded him of a former boss.

  The following day I found a job as a bricklayer’s assistant; eleven hours of work a day, thirty-two centimes an hour. I made 121 trips with a load of bricks to the second story of a house under construction. That night the muscles of my arms were so swollen and sore that I could barely touch them. I ate some potatoes roasted in the ashes and threw myself, dressed as I was, upon my bed, a heap of straw.
   At five in the morning I got up and went back to work. I quivered with impotent anger. The sight of the boss, with his fat, smug, self-satisfied face, gave me hydrophobia. On the third day he said to me, “ You’re too well-dressed.” He meant that to be significant. I felt like rebelling and breaking the head of that newly-rich peasant who accused me of being lazy while my bones were cracking under the strain. But what if I had done it? The employer is always right.
    When the end of the week came, I told the boss that I was going to leave and wanted my pay. He went into the office while I waited outside on the landing. When he came out he angrily thrust twenty-odd francs into my hand and snarled: “Here you are, it’s stolen money.” I was too dumbfounded to reply. What should I have done, killed him ? As a matter of fact, I turned away in silence. I was hungry and barefooted. A pair of almost new shoes that I had brought with me had been tom to shreds, on the rocks and bricks that had cut their way into my hands, my feet and my soul. I hurried, off to an Italian store-keeper and bought a pair of hobnailed shoes. The next morning I left for Lausanne.

Mussolini is now a renegade, boastful and unscrupulous, but “the swollen bullfrog of the Pontine marshes” cannot altogether eradicate his proletarian past: when aroused he sheds all bourgeois culture and instinctively adopts the manner of the class from which he sprang.

He is said to hold the view that the system will never get out of the present debacle : in an interview with a former “Socialist” colleague, he expressed himself thus: “It is the crisis of capitalism. I have always said so.”

   Why did Italy interfere in Spain ? The author above referred to gives us her opinion: "They feared the Socialist tendencies of die Spanish left, and they were anxious as to developments in France. At the time when they first sent help to General Franco—in July, 1936—Monsieur Blum’s Government was dependent on seventy Communist votes, and factories all over France were being occupied by the workers. Probably their chief reason for intervening was their fear that a barrier of Communism might bar Italy’s vital route to the west. Strategically, therefore, they needed a friendly Spain. Doubtless they also reckoned that if, in addition, they could secure an indebted and subservient Spain, they stood to strengthen their position, not only as a Mediterranean, but as an Atlantic power, that they would weaken Great Britain’s hold over the Straits of Gibraltar and that they would command France’s communications, not only from north to south, but from east to west, along North Africa, where her road and railway run so near the Spanish Moroccan frontier.

“But Italy’s past motives for intervening are unimportant in comparison with the question of the future: will she see a return for her intervention? Among a host of conjectures, two facts are clear: the first, that she did not expect so long or so expensive a campaign; the second, that she did not lend men and material without hope of reward.

“The Spanish campaign dragged its length along at a pace which could only have been foretold by a student of the Napoleonic or the earliest wars. Spain was poor in war material. Most of her army I equipment dated from before the War, and the nations who helped either side began by exporting out-of-date armaments, which, while useless to themselves, represented trump cards to the Spanish forces. But from the moment in November, 1936, when the Russians began to supply first-line aircraft, the situation changed. Italy and Germany were obliged in their turn to put their best foot forward. Italy could not afford to do so. Her war material was already spread over Abyssinia and Libya, and she was short of the raw materials necessary for quick replenishment. The risk of war in Europe demanded that she should keep control over the equipment supplied to General Franco: she was therefore obliged to supply him with men as well. Hence her despatch of whole units of the Italian Army.

“When this assistance did not bring the quick victory for which she hoped, she was caught in a vicious circle. The more she hoped General Franco the more she increased his chances of success, but the more she ran the risk of general war with her own armaments in a depleted state. On the other hand' to furnish insufficient help was to spin out a campaign the expense of which she could ill afford.

“By the end of 1937, voices at home were beginning to murmur against taxation for Spanish purposes. By 1938, when Germany had marched into Austria, they were suggesting that the Italians would be better employed in the Alps. But despite their murmurings. Signor Mussolini found difficulty in withdrawing his troops short of victory. He could not do so because a dictator must go from strength to strength. Like a man on a bicycle, he must keep moving or he will fall.”

Mussolini was able to compensate himself to some extent by obtaining some of the raw materials he so desperately needed. It is to be noted that business was carried on as usual during hostilities. Profit is never lost sight of, even during the horrors of a ghastly war.

The material and economic factors in the Spanish struggle have so far not received the attention they deserve.

France has the most at stake, inasmuch as French interests hold about sixty per cent. of the total foreign investments. The British share, representing about twenty per cent., lies chiefly in mining, and was in 1937 estimated at about £40 millions.

Great Britain and France, who hoped to preserve the status quo, tried to limit the struggle to small dimensions, and therefore championed non-intervention. Since their ideal was a weak Spain, the result that would have suited them best was a stalemate—a situation in which the two Spanish factions, sickened with inconclusive fighting, and with insufficient help from their respective patrons had turned to British and French bankers for reconstruction loans. Had this happened, the two powers would not only have remained strategically secure, but could have worked to recover any losses caused by the war among their considerable Spanish investments. From a purely self-interested standpoint, any other result was less satisfactory to them. “A victory for the extreme left would have caused misgivings in Great Britain if it had encouraged Communist tendencies in France. But once the expansionist powers were openly helping General Franco, a victory for the extreme right presented even graver drawbacks. Won at the cost of Spanish subservience to Italy or Germany, or both, it threatened both the British and French Empires with strategic, diplomatic, and perhaps even economic difficulties."

Certain diplomats held that the Italians would never retain a footing in Spain, because Spaniard and Italian could never agree, and that General Franco could be relied upon to eject his Fascist helpers as soon as he had won the war. The German menace they also dismissed. Spanish waters, they said, were an area in which British and French fleets could deploy with effect. Spain was easy to insulate, and any German forces operating from there could soon be immobilised.

Both these arguments are over-optimistic. The first disregards the tendency of totalitarian states to act together, despite human dislikes. Italy is immensely powerful in the Central Mediterranean, but weak at its either end, and, were she to gain any kind of foothold in Spain, would shatter the present delicate balance of Mediterranean forces. The second, though true as far as it goes, overlooks the main advantage that Herr Hitler can derive from dominance in Spain. His arms or influence there achieve their maximum potency, not as a war force, but as a pre-war nuisance. In the game of poker to which diplomacy is once more reduced, he heightens his chances of winning a hand if his troops can glower at France from the Pyrenees as well as the Rhine, if they can hang, spectre-like, over the French mobilisation channel, and if they can look briskly efficient on the hills on either side of the Straits of Gibraltar.

The development which culminated in such a situation was the logical outcome of the policy adopted by the victors of the last war.

Debts, reparations and the irksome situation forced upon the vanquished led to the dislocation of world trade and the fall of the gold standard. The very day that Britain went from gold to a sterling basis saw Japan begin her invasion of Manchuria and the launching of her new Far- Eastern policy.

The Ottawa Conference of 1932 saw the Dominions and the mother-country meet together under the flag of Empire to devise ways and means of evolving an economic plan that would foster the interests of Imperial Britain, no matter what became of the rest of the world.

Her late enemy retaliated with totalitarianism, and the spectacular rise and subsequent moves of the German dictator are due to an attempt to remove the strangling grip which Germany feels upon her economic windpipe.

Italy, in the decline of world trade, fights for a place in the sun, but is forced by economic and geographical circumstances to play second fiddle to the Nazi chief.

As in Austria, so in Spain, it seems that Herr Hitler might rake in the Italian stake with the nonchalance of a croupier. German intervention in the Iberian peninsula has been more skilful and more telling than the Italian: the Germans concentrated upon quality: to the fighting forces they lent only pilots, yet, by providing technical civilian help, they have contrived to gain a hold on all Spain’s activities, from her police and post offices to her civil aerodromes and some of her industries and mines.

The German “help" will not come to an end with the end of the civil war, and the realisation of this fact has upset all Anglo-French strategic planning. Great Britain is now burdened with fresh defence liabilities in the Atlantic and at Gibraltar, and France will feel the strain, not only at sea, but in the Pyrenees and in North Africa.

The hungry German received payment in Spanish ores from General Franco for services rendered. There is danger to British capitalist interests looming in the distance; the German armament industry, so they fear, is moving to secure the whole mineral output of Spain.

The list of Spanish minerals is long and varied. The chief deposits lie on the Atlantic side of the peninsula. First among them are the great reserves of iron ore in the north, near Bilbao, and, second in importance, the copper and pyrite deposits in the south-west, behind Huelva. The same region, where the British-owned Rio Tinto Company is the leading concern, also yields manganese and sulphur. The biggest mercury mine in the world is at Almaden, in Central Spain; there are rich deposits in the northern Catalonia and subsidiary supplies of iron ore are mined in Spanish Morocco.

The battles in the civil war were mostly fought for the possession of mines, rarely for military objectives.

The rumour that Germany was in full possession of the mineral wealth of Spain was exaggerated, but the story that she was procuring increasing quantities of Spanish ores was true. The position was roughly as follows: The buyers and sellers of the international mineral market are not governments, but business houses and, during the war, brisk sales of all Spain's minerals had continued almost without intermission. Most firms traded with their usual customers, regardless of the political colour of the part of Spain in which they were situated. Owing to rearmament and to the general business recovery which marked the year 1937, the whole world was buying more minerals, and Spanish sales were interrupted only when the mineral deposits were actually in the battle zone. For instance, the export of iron ore from the Bilbao district fell off while General Franco was actually capturing the area, but was resumed again, its direction little changed, as soon as the mines re-opened work.

A glance at Germany’s economic plight enables even the man in the street to perceive that the Germans were bound to try to increase their dominance in Spain. They were short of foreign exchange. Therefore, instead of straining to find francs and sterling in order to buy foreign ores from Lorraine or Canada, they were seeking a hold on mining areas which would accept a medium in which they could pay—that is, which could be made to take German goods or German services. Their object was to improve their general economic position rather than to swell their total import of ores.

From the British and French point of view, the prospect of greater German influence in Spain is less disquieting in the matter of minerals than in that of markets. If German experts were to secure all the key positions in the country Germany would be well placed for operating the device which she has already used so skilfully in south-eastern Europe—that is, she could run up bills, offer payment in German goods or not at all and confront the British, French or Italian exporter with crippling competition.

Economically, as well as diplomatically, therefore, Germany stands a chance of worsting the democratic countries and obtaining a substantial reward for her intervention policy. The recent occupation of Albania by Mussolini is probably due to an attempt to enhance the price he hopes to get from Britain and France when he withdraws from Spain.

British capitalism must get the European mess cleared up quickly: their interests in the Far East are in jeopardy. The war danger is exaggerated with a view of inducing men to line up to defend the country; they will more readily respond to an appeal for home defence than for service abroad. The French elections are due in 1940 and the United States goes to the polls during the same year.

The British ruling class want to be assured their friends are in power in these countries before they embark upon a hazardous enterprise, therefore our masters here will try to keep the peace until 1941.

But as G.B.S. says: “ You never can tell.” Capitalism is in difficulties and the acid test finds our exploiters wanting: they are mentally bankrupt; this is our opportunity.

Practically all newspapers now contain horoscopes; astrologers are reappearing as the guides of statesmen. When men are in fear they go back to the superstitions of their childhood.

Capitalism is the enemy, and, whether he appears as a democrat or a dictator, he can offer nothing but wage slavery to the working class.

Socialists everywhere oppose the principles of Scientific Socialism to the war plans of the ruling class in such a way that the class issue is kept clear and the real aims of the ruling class exposed.

Their battle-cry is: “ Working men of all countries unite.”

The true soldier of the proletariat replies to the war threat of capitalism by lining up his class for Socialism.

Charles Lestor

The Historical Background of Hitlerism (1939)

From the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

"National Socialism” marks a stage in the national reconsolidation of German capitalism. A variety of factors have contributed to its success, most important of which we have attempted to outline below.

The Bourgeois Revolution

In "Revolution and Counter Revolution,” Frederick Engels has described the state of Germany in 1848 in the following words: 

   The composition of the different classes of the people which form the groundwork of every political organisation, was in Germany more complicated than in any other country. While in England and France feudalism was entirely destroyed, or, at least, reduced, as in the former country, to a few insignificant forms by a powerful and wealthy middle class concentrated in large towns and particularly in the capital, the feudal nobility in Germany had retained a great portion of their privileges. The feudal system of tenure was prevalent almost everywhere. . . . Feudalism was more flourishing in some localities than in others, but nowhere, except on the left bank of the Rhine, was it entirely destroyed. The feudal nobility, then extremely numerous and partly very wealthy, was considered officially the first ‘Order' in the country. It furnished the higher government officials, it almost exclusively officered the army.

Engels then goes on to show how circumstances ripened in Germany for the overthrow of feudalism. The bourgeoisie, supported by the majority of the peasantry and the workers, took the initiative in an attempt to dislodge their feudal oppressors from power, but capitulated in cowardly fashion the moment these former elements sponsored their own independent demands. Says Engels, in weighing up the results of the revolution: 

  The industrial and commercial capitalist class were more severely defeated in Germany than in any other country; they were first worsted, broken, expelled from office in every individual State of Germany, and then put to rout, disgraced and hooted in the central German Parliament. Political Liberalism, the rule of the bourgeoisie, be it under a monarchial or republican form of government, is for ever impossible in Germany.

The First German Reich

The semi-feudal empire established in 1871 granted the capitalists a large number of economic concessions in return for the latter's acquiescence in the political domination of the Hohemzollerns. From this period onwards the bourgeoisie directed its main attention to the possibility of enriching itself at the expense of the ever-growing number of proletarians brought about by the rapid industrialisation of the country. The Bismarckian Empire was not a unitary state. It was composed of twenty-two federal states, each of which had its own ruler, its own government, and even its own legislative bodies. A number of these states also had their own postal and railway administrations, and even their own armies.

It was against this background that Social Democracy arose. The Eisenach Party, formed by August Bebel (a disciple of Marx) in 1869, adopted a programme which, in the light of the period, constituted a definite advance in working class ideas. When, in 1875, that movement abandoned its original programme in favour of a policy of compromise and reformism, Marx bitterly denounced it (see his “Critique of Gotha Programme"). However, three years later, Bismarck's anti-Socialist laws forced the party underground. In 1891 the resuscitated movement was reconstituted with a new programme—the Erfurt Programme—in which the influence of Marx and Engels once more made itself felt. But not for long. The inclusion of a policy of “immediate demands" very soon swamped the party with reformist elements. The original goal was lost sight of and by 1914 the party had degenerated into a pure and simple bourgeois reform movement. So much so, that, with few exceptions, it was to be found aiding and abetting the capitalists and Junkers in their prosecution of the World War.

The Second Reich

Defeat in the War, 1914-1918, had as its consequence the breakdown of the German military and semi-feudal state apparatus. When the Kaiser fled the task of rehabilitating capitalism fell into the hands of Social Democracy. They were by far the largest party and had the greatest backing throughout the country from the war-weary workers now ready to give parliamentary democracy a trial. In 1919 the Weimar Constitution was drawn up and, as a result of the elections, plus support from the “Centre," etc., the Social Democrats became the first republican government. The latter was, however, handicapped in consolidating its authority by several hostile forces. Principal among these were the Spartacists—followers of Karl Liebhnecht and Rosa Luxemburg—and another group, which desired to imitate the Russian example (later it became the Communist Party). Feeling its authority undermined, the government, in order to crush the rebels, enlisted the aid of reactionary generals and officers—the extreme right-wing, as they were called. Such action could not but spell disaster for the republic, for these reactionary hirelings, once reinstated, plotted against their benefactors and came out openly against them when their influence amongst the masses had waned. The rehabilitation of capitalism in a defeated country created a mass of problems to a party ushering in a new political regime. Social Democracy, being unable to master those problems, the inevitable discontent vented itself on that regime—the Weimar Republic.

On the other hand, the capitalists, sighing for the return of their markets and trade routes, were beginning to look elsewhere, turning a sympathetic ear to the new message of Adolf Hitler, national capitalism, mis-labelled “ national Socialism."

Adolf Hitler

From being a mere handful of disgruntled officers who had severely suffered in prestige as a result of their abortive Putsch in 1924, the Nazis soon gained in influence. Adolf Hitler had learned a lot from his failure—particularly had he learned the need to win over the masses. Hence the new party must have a programme wide enough to appeal to practically all sections of the population. Mob oratory, anti-Semitism, nationalism and pseudo-Socialism now became his stock-in-trade. The objective situation became ripe for the Nazis after 1930. The economic crisis which had then broken out became aggravated by the widespread withdrawal of foreign investments and the cessation of loans. Meanwhile the numbers of the unemployed had increased to seven millions, whilst those in employment were periodically having their wages reduced. The failure of government after government to master the situation brought the democratic republic into ever-greater disrepute. A state of parliamentary paralysis had begun to set in (the “Communists" as well as the Nazis are to blame for this). The Nazis were not slow to cash-in on this wave of anti-parliamentarian sentiment. But, in addition, the leading capitalists ceased their support for the Republic. The Social Democrats had served a purpose. They had preserved capitalism in the post-war years. They could no longer aid the bourgeoisie in its long-delayed quest for aggrandisement. For that a new type of militarism was necessary. Not the militarism of the early Bismarckian era, utilised mainly in the interests of a backward land-owning group, but one which looked beyond the borders of the Prussian State for its ideal. A movement, in short, which could bring to reality all the unfulfilled dreams of a century—national centralisation and consolidation, with a view to re-entering the imperialist arena, this time unfettered by any feudal restrictions. The Nazi movement embodied these ideals and Hitler had set them down in “Mein Kampf." And so it has come about. Under the influence of the masses, Germany has become a “totalitarian state." All autonomous regional governments have been abolished. We have witnessed the absorption of Austria, Memel and Czechoslovakia. Thus the Nazi movement has been instrumental in consummating the uncompleted bourgeois revolution of 1848, in addition to preparing the ground for an imperialist conflict. This is the real historical content of Hitlerism stripped of all confusing detail. It is only by the appreciation of this analysis that any effective struggle against Fascism can be waged.

The Outlook

And now what of the future? Is all lost as far as Germany is concerned? Unquestionably the possibility of working for Socialism there has received a set-back, but opposition to Hitler still goes on. That this is so is proved by the existence of secret police, concentration camps, and by the brutal methods of suppression. For the latter would surely be unnecessary if ninety-nine per cent. of the population were actively behind the Führer. If war does not intervene, capitalism is bound, sooner or later, to produce a major economic crisis, which will shake the confidence of the masses in the papal infallibility of their hero. That would be a first step. But by whatever means Hitler is eventually overthrown. Fascism can be no more a permanent phase than was the tyrannical Napoleonic regime of the Second Empire. Meanwhile we must strengthen our forces in this country and await the day when we can openly join hands with our German comrades for the overthrow of international capitalism.

S. G. & S. K.

National Service or International Socialism? (1939)

From the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

The ruling class have shown on many occasions that they are past-masters in the art of inducing self-deception among the workers. A typical instance is the attitude adopted on the subject of Air Raid Precautions and National Service.

Previous to the war crisis of last September, military and aeronautical experts were writing books, composing articles and making speeches, which described the advance made in the manufacture of poison gases and high explosives since the last war, and pointed the moral that, under such “improved" conditions, attack must always prevail over defence.

These views were confirmed by the mock air raids which were held each summer, the results of which inspired Conservative Premier Baldwin to remark that, in a future war, “the bomber will always get through."

The September crisis changed all this. Our capitalist masters, realising the important part which the civilian population would have to play in the defence of private property if war was declared, set about “correcting" the notions of bombers getting through, and countered such alarming statements by an A.R.P. and National Service advertising campaign, the extent of which is obvious to everyone.

Obvious, also, is the volte face which has taken place. Pre-crisis: “Attack must win." Post-crisis: “ We must concentrate on defence." The deception is evident. Both statements cannot be true. Before passing judgment, however, let us briefly examine A.R.P. The estimate for this body is thirty-two millions, compared with two thousand millions for armaments. From the class standpoint, deep, well-constructed, reinforced shelters for the capitalist; he can pay the bill. For many workers, tin huts, guaranteed (whatever this means) to be splinter-proof. Perhaps the utility of these objects can be assessed by the fact that, for most of the wage-slaving recipients, the shelters are provided free.

Let it be remembered that the occupants of these precarious guarantors of splinter-proof existence will be producers and distributors of the means of living. As for the master class—one seems to remember comments echoing from the Great War years—something about profiteering. The problem of concussion has evidently been ignored, so far as working class safety is concerned. Workers who served in the last War have strange tales to tell of dug-outs full of khaki-clad workers untouched by splinters, but killed by concussion produced by an exploding shell; and high explosives have become much more destructive since 1918.

Once again, then, we see the value of human life fluctuate according to the class position of the. persons concerned. To the contrasts between capitalist limousine and worker’s tuppeny bus ticket, between capitalist three-month sea cruise and worker’s annual week at Margate, between capitalist country mansion and worker’s big town barrack, can now be added the contrast between shelters for the capitalist and shoddy (once again) for members of our class. A.R.P. has no answer to problems such as this.

Incidentally, the number of workers who have rallied to the call for volunteers seems to have fallen short of expectations; one detects a note of anxiety in the posters which are asking for thousands more.

National Service needs little comment. The blatant attempt to organise, militarise and coerce the workers has been recognised by Socialists from the outset. We cannot over-stress the fact that in modern capitalist society the interval between one war and another cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as Peace. The struggle between the possessors of the means of wealth production and the dispossessed, between capitalist class and working class, transcends all circumstances of war or so-called peace; and along with this class antagonism runs the inevitable parallel (while the workers remain politically ignorant) of the allocation by the ruling class of ever larger proportions of their wealth for armaments, not forgetting the huge bill which must be met for war propaganda on a nation-wide scale; an essential weapon to a ruling class bent on protecting its interests against the threat of a foreign capitalist group.

Hence National Service, the up-to-date variant of King-and-Country, World Freedom, etc.

Now about ourselves. The Socialist Party has as its object the establishment of a social order based upon the ownership by the community of the means of living. We need a majority of our class, desiring it, to bring this about; but the workers in that majority will not be enrolled in National Service or A.R.P. Neither will they be supporters of the capitalist system, with its periodical quarrels between national sections of the international ruling class over the wealth produced by the workers.

The establishment of the Socialist society will result from the efforts of workers who understand not only the class antagonisms of the present system, but also the need for a classless society in which wealth will be produced only for use; the elimination of the class basis will also eliminate the profit motive.

Without this fundamentally class-conscious outlook, capitalist wars, and consequently working class slaughter, will always be a riddle to members of our class whose discontent with the present order of things need Socialist understanding to give direction and effectiveness to that discontent. We members of the Socialist Party proceed towards our objective, firstly, by educating ourselves, and, secondly, by passing on that education to our
1 fellow workers in the form of Socialist propaganda.

Therefore, applying our Socialist understanding to war preparation, we state our case.

While the working class tolerates the capitalist system, commercial and imperialist rivalries between capitalist states will always tend to find their expression in war, involving the destruction of countless workers' lives. The greater the support given by workers to National Service and A.R.P., the nearer will war become. On the other hand, the greater the resistance by members of our class to war and its preparation, the greater will be the possibility of making the Socialist majority of workers, who, having decided to abolish the private ownership of the means of life, will take hold of the political machinery for that purpose. With political control, this further step will be possible: the armed forces of the capitalist states will become an anachronism in a social system where there are no markets to safeguard and no trade routes to protect.

The common ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution will necessitate other activities being found for the members of the derelict armies, navies and air forces of capitalism; activities based upon social utility, rather than wholesale mortality. But that, fellow workers, will be Socialism.

F. G. Walker.

Answers to Correspondents (1939)

Letters to the Editors from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Equal Pay for Equal Work

Mr. J. Bolge (S.E.20) asks: “What is the Socialist solution for the problem of 'unequal pay’ ?” And adds: “ Perhaps there is none under the present system.” He has anticipated our reply. The employer is not interested in abstract principles of equality, but in getting the kind of workers he wants as cheaply as possible. If he finds that large numbers of suitable applicants for a particular kind of work are available, he takes advantage of this to force down wages, and trade unions can only offer a limited amount of resistance to pressure in such circumstances. Mr. G. B. Shaw —in splendid isolation—advocates equal wages for everyone, but nobody supposes that this is practicable. Neither the workers nor the capitalists desire it.

Various groups of people advocate other schemes in the name of ” equality.” The best known are the advocates of “equal pay for men and women,” duly qualified by the words “for equal work.” They have in mind the cases where men and women work side by side, yet the man is more highly paid. This they say is “unfair"; to which men reply that “equal" wages are equally unfair, because of the married man's greater financial responsibilities. Generally speaking, however, the advocates of equal pay for men and women do not ask that charwomen should receive equal pay with women teachers, nor do the opponents of it favour equal pay for male bus drivers and bank clerks. In defence of their inconsistency, both groups raise the question of the so-called “value of work," but this is pure illusion. There is no way in which the so-called "value" of one kind of work can be measured against that of another kind.

Dustmen and doctors both perform services which are very useful to those who benefit by them, but how can the usefulness of the two be measured and compared? In actual fact, when they talk of “value of work" and “comparative value of work," what they are really doing is to accept the current extreme contempt for so-called “manual" and “menial” work, and use it as a lever to get increased wages for those kinds of work which in capitalist eyes are less despicable. The capitalistically minded teacher, or bank clerk, or chemist making poison gas, sneers at the dustman, and claims that his work is “more valuable" and should, therefore, be better paid.

The only solution for the friction and resentments aroused among workers by the wages system and its illogical workings is not a differently regulated wages system, but the abolition of the wages system—i.e., Socialism.

Ed. Comm.

Mr. Ralph Oder (New York). We have your inquiry about the conclusion of the article on page 178 of the December, 1938, issue. It is certainly ambiguous. The meaning it was intended to convey is that the Socialist movement, in fighting to achieve Socialism, is at the same time safeguarding democracy. 

Ed. Comm.

Mr. Graham Boatfield (Ashford). For statements on "Collective Security" and “War for democracy," see The Socialist Standard for October, 1938, and February, 1939.

Ed. Comm.

Mr. L. S. Chell (N.W.9). We will endeavour to get an article on the subject in the near future.

Ed. Comm.

Mr. W. V. Andrews (Wickford). Different economists and statisticians use different definitions of "National Income" according to the purpose for which they are to be used. All of their definitions include both profits and wages. You will find a statement on the subject in Chapter .I of "The National Income," by Colin Clark (MacMillan & Co., 1932), and in "The National Income," by Bowley & Stamp (Clarendon Press, 1927).

Ed. Comm.

Mr. R. Mead (High Wycombe). The basis of your criticism of our attitude towards the Bolshevists is your belief that Russia “is undoubtedly striving towards, and will soon attain, real Communism." If you will give us the reasons for your belief we will examine them.

You are wrong in saying that the S.P.G.B. opposes Popular Fronts simply because they are not composed of Socialists. The question is whether Popular Fronts can succeed in achieving what is claimed for them. We say no. Incidentally, we notice that you believe a “so-called Dictatorship is inevitable" in order to achieve Socialism. How do you square this with your support of Popular Fronts, which are intended to preserve democracy?

Ed. Comm.

The Wages of Agricultural Workers

In the January issue of The Socialist Standard we stated that "it has been estimated that as many as twenty-five per cent, of agricultural workers are being paid less than the minimum wage legally applicable to them."

Mr. Andrews (Wickford, Essex) wrote, asking how this information was obtained. Unfortunately, we were at the moment unable to name the source of our information (See Socialist Standard, April), but we can now give details.

The “sweating" of agricultural workers by farmers was dealt with in The Socialist Standard (July, 1931, p. 174, and October, 1934, p. 30).

From the earlier issue we quote the following: " According to Reynolds's Illustrated News (April 12th, 1931), in 1930, 4,523 farms were inspected, as a result of which there were 1,630 claims for arrears of wages. Reynolds's Agricultural Correspondent estimates that 'one farmer in four throughout the country is violating the law.' This estimate is based on official inspections over a number of years in every part of the country."

Why the Workers are Not Anti-Patriotic

A correspondent in Canada writes about the quotation from the pre-war Mussolini that "The proletariat is anti-patriotic by definition and necessity." He points out that workers in all lands are in the main not at all anti-patriotic, although, the necessity exists all right.

As regards the quotation, its form makes it somewhat ambiguous. Although Mussolini (writing, of course, in his Syndicalist days) used the expression “The proletariat is anti-patriotic," that was only intended as a concise way of saying that the proletariat, being a subject class, ought to recognise the necessity of being anti-patriotic.

The trouble is, that although the workers' class position is such that their interests lie in internationalism and the fight to establish Socialism, in the main they do not realise this. All the trappings of state, the flag-wagging, uniforms, coronation ceremonies, are used to disguise the truth from the workers, and all of the capitalist parties and the churches help to keep the truth hidden. Not least dangerous among these agencies of confusion are the jumped-up Labour leaders and ex-Labour leaders, from Mussolini to J. H. Thomas, Clynes, etc. They have learned the trick of combining nationalism with pseudo-Socialism, as in Hitler’s National Socialist or Nazi movement, and the various patriotic so-called Labour Parties.

There is no cure for this except knowledge and experience on the part of the workers, but it is helped by the way in which, from time to time, every country witnesses brutal and open subjection of the workers and their organisations by the employers—with the help of the armed forces of the state. Even the most dazzling of flags fail to fill empty bellies.

P. S.

Outdoor Propaganda (May) (1939)

Party News from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

This Month's Quotation: Heinrich Heine (1939)

The Front Page quote from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

   “Everywhere we are stared down on by Wealth and Respectability, while crammed away in retired lanes and dark, damp alleys Poverty dwells with her rags and her tears.”

Heinrich Heine (“The Wonder of London.")

The Miserable Condition of Domestic Workers (1939)

Letter to the Editors from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

We have received the following letter from a domestic worker. It needs no comment.

“Highgate, N.6.

"To The Socialist Standard.

"I am a domestic worker, a reader of your paper, and a Socialist, as far as one can live to an ideal.

“As such a worker I consider middle class employers to be part of the make up of the master class.

“After twenty-one years, working under this rotten system, I find people who employ one, two or three maids as much in fault for the tragic hell of the workers as Church, mill and factory owners.

“Domestic service is one of the vilest systems in existence, with its filthy snobbery and low-down meanness.

“The Labour and Communist parties shield the middle class, being part and parcel of it.

“The Socialist Standard writes of the exploited lives of the factory, mill, and shop worker. Yet one reads nothing of the tragic suffering and mental torture of the domestic worker. Although a body of workers not needed in a Socialist state, yet truly so in a capitalist one, where laziness and snobbery, especially in the female sex, thrive.

“Why should a seemingly decent paper forget the existence of a rotten system, namely, Domestic Service ?

                                                                                                               “Yours fraternally,

                                                                                                                                       “E. J.”

May-Day in Bedlam (1939)

From the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Marching of Armies coincides with the May-Day March of the Workers. In every country in Europe, preparations for war are being feverishly concluded, so that everything seems set for yet another orgy of mass-murder.

And remember, it is a mere twenty years since the last “War to end all Wars”—barely time for a new generation to be born and ripen into manhood.

Twenty years of poverty, of slums, of unemployment, of struggling and starving, and now, with supreme contempt for the millions who were the sufferers, your rulers may want you to fight and die so that those who come after you may perhaps inherit another twenty years of that self-same existence.

It is not too late, even now, for the common people of this and other lands to halt in their mad stampede to the slaughter-house and ask themselves WHY?

Many people believe they have got the answer. “Liberty is at stake," they say; “that precious freedom for which our forefathers fought.” Others maintain that “Hitler and Mussolini must be stopped, else they will seek to dominate the world.” With such fine-sounding phrases do working class men and women delude themselves, blindly ignoring what happened in 1914-1918, when those very same slogans lured millions to a horrible death.

The workers of Britain and France are not alone in their fatal ignorance. In Germany and Italy masses of people are convinced that they will be fighting for “a place in the sun,” for “room to expand,” not knowing or understanding that their working class opposite in the "Glorious British Empire” is just as sun-starved and cramped in his slum-cage of poverty.

It's "Class" that Counts

That is the great tragedy of to-day: the workers have not yet learned their most important lesson, the lesson of CLASS.

They allow themselves to be lined up as Britons, Frenchmen, Germans or Italians, never as workers and capitalists. Yet a German, Herr Thyssen, has more in common with a British .Lord Nuffield than with the men he employs.

Bata, the Czech boot manufacturer, comes to England and is still a capitalist, merely exploiting British wage-slaves instead of Czechs.

So capitalism puts everyone in his place, not according to language or nationality, but according to the economic position. That is the fundamental fact for the workers to consider, and all other questions mean little in comparison.

Remembering this, you must understand why the Socialist will not support a capitalist war to prevent Hitler or Mussolini grabbing parts of Europe or of the British Empire. For that Empire has no more meaning for the worker here, or anywhere else, than has the gold in the Bank of England. He knows it is there and is told that it belongs to him. But he has never been able to make any use of it, for the simple reason that it does not belong to him at all: any more than the street he lives in. And the native population in those parts of the world have so far shown no signs of preference for any of the imperialist gangs. It is a different question for those who have been able to invest large sums of money in those places. Owners of oil wells, of diamond mines, of rubber plantations, those are the people who are seriously perturbed by the threat of German and Italian aggression, and rightly so. For they fear the loss of their property and income, and it is that fear which is responsible for the enormous outlay on armaments by the British capitalist class, a class that not so long ago pleaded poverty as a reason for reducing unemployment pay by ten per cent.

When the British Government pledges with open heart to protect the “independence” of poor little Greece or Rumania or Poland, many coloured inhabitants in parts of the British Empire may well be making rude noises. For they are feeling the iron heel of a despotism that is comparable with anything “made in Germany.” So we are I left with the fact that neither on economic nor moral grounds should British workers trouble to defend the Empire.

If Hitler attacks Britain!

Here we are confronted with another bogey. Should we then put up no resistance at all and “allow Hitler to march his hordes into Britain?” Here at least there are some liberties left, and surely to kneel before Hitler and his like would mean the instant suppression of all freedom, including the right to put forward Socialist propaganda. This latter point is considered by our opponents as clinching their argument, and they point triumphantly to Germany and Italy, where in very truth all kinds of opposition have been ruthlessly suppressed. Is this not to be resisted? we are asked.

We will agree without hesitation that Socialist propaganda is worth preserving. But is it going to be preserved by lining up under the banner of British Imperialism in a war that will kill millions?

The first point that arises is the obvious fact that when Socialists allow themselves to be recruited for such a war they do not only commit suicide physically but ideologically as well. For they renounce completely the fundamental axiom of Socialism, namely, the directly conflicting interests of workers and capitalists, a conflict that, so far from being abrogated during a war, stands out in sharper contrast than ever. For that war, although it will be fought mainly by the workers, will not be RUN by the workers; it will be run by the ruling class, and their method will be to crush ruthlessly any attempt to express any working class opposition, whether in the factory or politically. In other words, the workers will have to place themselves wholly under an iron control of militaristic capitalism, and who is going to argue that if and when such a war is ended workers can start again where they left off?

In France to-day, the tactics advocated here “for the defence of democracy" have led to the establishment of a virtual dictatorship, which has as its first reactionary step stolen from the French working class all and more than was gained previously by independent working class action. If the workers here are stupid enough to fall for the same lies, they will be rewarded with savage economic and political oppression.

And, above everything, try and remember something about the last Great War. Then the Kaiser "had to be stopped." Ten million human beings who took part in stopping him were killed. millions more were maimed and wounded. The Kaiser is still living, enjoying a comfortable old age in his castle at Doorn. In his stead rules an even worse despotism, produced in part by the bitterness left over by the last war. What will the end of the next war bring? No one can tell for certain, but one thing it will not and cannot bring: that is a real and permanent peace and freedom from oppression. Neither can it bring relief from poverty.

And those objects alone are worth fighting for. We do not preach passive acquiescence to Fascism any more than to any of the other evils for which capitalism is responsible. We preach the Struggle for Socialism. And that struggle is not for a Utopia of a dim and distant future. For in its development we can play a more and more effective part. As the Socialist movement extends its influence to an ever-widening circle of the working class, so will we be able to actively interfere with the machinations of the capitalists, whether they be of so-called “peace" or even those of war. Let there be signs to-day that more and more workers are becoming class-conscious enough to understand the real causes of capitalist wars and see how quickly our rulers would forget their international quarrels.

There are those who say that, by preaching Socialism to-day, we are playing right into the hands of Fascist reaction. We want to remind those people of what happened during the last war in one country—Russia.

The workers and peasants there were not Socialists. But they refused to fight and turned their attention to their real enemy at home. And what was the result ? Not only did they drive out a most reactionary regime, but their move helped to play a decisive part in the collapse of German imperialism, and thus hastened the end of the war. How much better could a strengthened Socialist Party in this country play its part in bringing home to workers everywhere die madness of fighting each other in the interests of the class that oppresses and exploits them.

We call upon you, Fellow Worker, to help us. Our message on this May-Day, in a world driven mad by capitalist greed and brutality, is the message of Marx and Engels:—

“ Working men of all lands. Unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains; you have a World to Win !"

Sid Rubin

May-Day and the War Clouds (1939)

Editorial from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

MAY-DAY, 1939, finds working class internationalism at its lowest ebb for many a year. How low can be seen from the success the rulers have had in the various countries in turning May-Day demonstrations from their former purpose. The celebration of Labour Day each year was formerly a spontaneous gesture by the workers' organisations that they repudiated the national hatreds fostered by reactionary interests for their own profit-seeking ends. By this sign the producers of the world's wealth gave, expression to their longing for peace and their growing desire to co-operate with their fellow workers in other lands. But the year 1939 finds May-Day half submerged in the growing tide of nationalism and war preparation. In Germany, May-Day has been filched by the Nazi Government and turned into a compulsory parade demonstrating the gigantic powers of the war-machine and the equally gigantic suppressive power of the Nazi State apparatus over the ideas and longings of the working class. And the dictator-states are not alone in their fever of nationalism. It is reported from France that the French trade unions, which have just had to sacrifice their forty-hour week and go over to sixty hours for armament work, have this year decided, in the same cause, to refrain from their customary stoppage of work to celebrate May-Day. At the same time, Parliamentary Government in France has reached a precarious stage under the system of emergency powers to facilitate the armament programme and war preparations.

In Great Britain the call for conscription has already succeeded.

Thus does the set-back of the working class movement on one side of a frontier exercise its evil influence on working class movements everywhere. In Great Britain, too, the year 1939 sees working class organisations being drawn deeper and deeper into the mire of nationalism and war preparation.

Of course there are many voices assuring the workers that their mistrust of this trend is mistaken. Telling them that defence of the Anglo-French Empires against the German-Italian encroachments is in the interest of democracy, and is therefore in accord with "true" internationalism and social progress: but those voices carry a false message. There is no practical effective internationalism except that which springs strong and self-reliant from the workers' community of interest, sweeping across national frontiers like a cleansing wind blowing away bestial hatreds and fears. The future of the human race demands the destruction of the national barriers which divide the peoples of the world. Not the defence of national independence but the destruction of capitalism must be the watchword of those who would build for the future of the human race and at the same time help to stem the flood of war in which capitalism threatens to engulf civilisation. The doctrine that each group of workers should rally round their own ruling class in defence of the “national interest” only plays into the hands of the war-makers in every country. Just as British and French workers gain hope and courage whenever they read of German and Italian workers who have resisted the mass propaganda of their rulers for war and nationalism, so also the internationally minded workers in Germany and Italy would be inspired to further brave efforts if they heard that their British and French comrades were refusing to ally themselves with Anglo-French imperialism: and correspondingly depressed to learn that many of those workers were falling into line behind their capitalist rulers.

For, make no mistake, Europe is not on tire verge of war for the sake of Nazism and Democracy, but for the sake of a re-division of the spoils of the last great capitalist war.

From a working-class point of view, the ideological differences between Chamberlain and Hitler are as nothing to the common cause they both espouse—the capitalist cause. When Hitler declares that German capitalism must export or perish, the representative of British imperialism, Mr. Robert Hudson, Secretary for Overseas Trade, answers in the same language of predatory capitalism: —

We are not going to give up any markets to anyone . . .  Great Britain is strong enough to fight for markets abroad. Britain is now definitely going to take a greater interest in Eastern Europe.—(Speech in Warsaw, March 21st. News Chronicle, March 22nd, 1939.)

Let the British and German capitalists quarrel about their profit-seeking interests. Let British workers set an example to their fellows in all lands by proclaiming that the interest of the working class is in internationalism, not in wars for markets. Let working-class May-Day be an answer to all who would seek to turn the thoughts of the workers to nationalism and war.

Long live Proletarian May-Day!Long live International Socialism!

Parliamentary Activity (1939)

Party News from the May 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are now in a position to speak with greater confidence of our plans in connection with the Party’s campaign in the Parliamentary constituency of East Ham North. A number of Party members have responded in a gratifying manner to the recent call for canvassers. Dagenham branch’s response was immediate and consisted of an offer to accept complete responsibility for canvassing and literature distribution in one part of the constituency. This is good work—and sound from the organisational point of view. If all branches, particularly local ones, assumed responsibility for other parts of East Ham, and could undertake all the work involved in their part, then the work would run itself simply and would not involve those of us at Head Office who are concerned with coordinating activities, with unnecessary worry. Dagenham’s example is not an isolated one, though at the moment, it is the most healthy. We have received a response from the membership in most branches, which, shall we say, is encouraging, though not completely satisfactory nor sufficient for our needs. Quite obviously, many Party members imagine that we should come after them. This attitude is a mistaken one, though, of course, it is not meant to be unhelpful. We cannot hope to know the capabilities of members, even if we were personally acquainted with them all. Nor are we able to judge what the resources are of branches for giving assistance. We have, therefore, to depend chiefly on the response to written appeals in some form or other. If this fact were realised we are sure all our difficulties would rapidly be solved. That is not to say that we make no individual contacts, but they must of necessity be limited.

Certain aspects of the work done so far give us great encouragement. We have disturbed the rest of local parties and politicians who regard us as poachers on their preserves. We shall disturb them all the more in the forthcoming season of outdoor propaganda activity. We plan a campaign including canvassing, literature distribution, bill-posting, intense propaganda, loud-speaker publicity and, if we can manage to provoke our opponents to bite—debates.

Comrades, your co-operation and disciplined efforts will make those plans an enormous success. Remember, one of the topical issues of the day, war and peace, promotes a ready interest in the Party’s case. Our message stands alone. It is worth every ounce of energy that you can give it —it is worth some sacrifice. Give—willingly and generously. You will enjoy it.

PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEE.