Dear Old Pals. The Anglo-German line up (1954)

From the December 1954 issue of the Socialist Standard

Well! Well! So the Germans are Britain’s Allies now! Dr. Adenauer himself has said “it is astonishing.”

“Britain and Germany have signed a treaty to defend one another instead of attacking each other "—(Sunday Express, 24/10/54.)

It must be a great comfort to the people. After two most frightful wars to smash Germany down, the capitalists of Britain and America are now intent on building Western Germany up.

Those past the half-century mark, with a moment to spare for introspection, may well recall the scenes of days gone by. “Pack up your troubles in your old kit-bag!” “It’s a long way to Tipperary.” “Keep the Home Fires Burning.” The Recruiting Office in Whitehall packed with jostling crowds fighting to get into the army first. The Derby Scheme with its armlet, German bakers' shops looted. “ Society ladies chasing about with white feathers. The Great Shell Shortages! Lloyd-George! Minister of Munitions.

The 1915 disasters, Lloyd-George, Prime Minister 

The same Sunday newspaper which reported the news of the Anglo-German Alliance is serialising a new biography of David Lloyd-George.

“To-day’s episode tells of a military disaster which caused grief and misery in nearly four hundred thousand British homes.”

It is the story of Passchendaele, the most stupid and disastrous blunder of the 1918 war.

Four hundred thousand men floundered through mud knee-deep to their doom, trying to capture a piece of land the size of Green Park, Piccadilly.

This was the area at which Haig’s Chief of Staff, Kiggel, visiting the scene after the battle, broke down and wept, sobbing “Good God! did we really send men to fight in that”

That same Passchendaele of which Siegfried Sassoon wrote:

“If I were bald, and fat, and short of breath 

I’d live with scarlet majors at the base 

And speed glum heroes up the line to death 

You’d see me with my puffy petulant face 

Gulping and guzzling in the best hotel 

Poor young chap. I’d say, I knew his father well.

Yes! we lost heavily in that last scrap 

And when war was o’er and youth stone-dead 

I’d toddle safely home and die—in bed ”

Months afterwards, years afterwards, Lloyd-George was asked, if he knew how idiotic Haig and Robertson really were, why he did not sack them out of hand. In his Memoirs he said he dared not take the risk, when the Press were supporting the High Command, which might have required a General Election.

This explanation may satisfy Mr. Owen and some of his readers. It will not do for Socialists. The Socialist Party has a very vivid recollection of those war years.

It was during 1915 and '16 when Haig was “speeding glum heroes up the line to death" that our public meetings were smashed up by hysterically-patriotic members of the British working class.

The self-same violently nationalistic propaganda-drunk workers who cheered Haig’s ludicrous military blunders—booed the Socialist Party speakers who stood up to say that the war was for profits, and would bring workers nothing but disaster.

While nearly a million British soldiers staggered through a sea of mud in Belgium a tiny handful tried to fight through the sea of lies at home—the odds proved too great—the Socialist Party did the only thing possible, stood down until a few more workers came to their senses.

This is the real explanation of those harrowing events. Even two years afterwards, Lloyd-George could still win an election on “Homes for Heroes,” “Make Germany Pay,” and “ Hang the Kaiser,” though the victory was short lived. The political ignorance of the working-class was the ground upon which Haig could hound them to death.

It was this ignorance which blinded workers to their own interests. Understanding nothing of class society, the majority of workers thought they had something to gain from the defeat of Germany. They thought it their interest to prevent German capitalists acquiring British trade. Most of them thought their employers their benefactors—not their exploiters. In brief, knowing nothing of Socialism they supported Capitalism—and inevitably its wars.

Lloyd-George’s election stunts became notorious. The mere mention of “‘Homes for Heroes” got laughs for years, but, after many twists and turns, Baldwin, Ramsay Mac, Chamberlain and Co., the same old routine started all over again.

The same blunders were repeated in 1939/45 by military commanders who must not be mentioned because they have not yet “died in bed.” 1939, a change of labels—but basically the same—and a working class which still did not know that society is divided into two classes, with opposing interests, marched, or now, was rushed, to the shambles in fast trucks.

By now, science had “improved” war. No need to rush to the front, the aeroplane dropped it on you. Still, the workers support their masters, although 60,000 registered objection to the war.

And now, after two doses, Britain and Germany are Allies, “pledged to defend each other against a common aggressor.” What again? Yes! All over again.

And will all those who marched to smash Germany and “make her pay” rise up as one man in burning indignation at the futile squandering of life and wealth in two past wars, and cry aloud—"We will not fight for Germany, and mock our fallen comrades?”

They will not.

Until such time as a sizeable number of workers are Socialists, the people remain hydrogen-bomb dust for the modern Douglas Haigs.

Horatio.