War and Humanity (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

After what is now cynically referred to as World War I, there sprang into existence a number of organisations whose propaganda could be summed up as “No More War.” One line of approach was to publish illustrated pamphlets showing in vivid photographic detail the effect of near explosions on the bodies of human victims, adding such captions as “This was a man.” They reasoned that the coming of another war could be prevented if they successfully appealed to the human sense of self-preservation. How mistaken they were in spite of their humanitarian motives, we who have passed through World War II know only too well. We became “hardened” to the daily scenes of destruction caused by air raids and V weapons, and knew from our own experiences what the great bomb loads were doing to the people of Germany. They, like us, for all that was assumed to the contrary, could and did “take it.” The Burgomaster of Hamburg in an interview with Edward J. Hart of the Sunday Express said : —

“But like Londoners we have shown we can take it. even when the streets were piled with our dead in their thousands. You have seen for yourselves what has been done to us here, yet when your 18 hour curfew is lifted and you meet our people going about their daily business in street and shop you will find there is no hatred in Hamburg for British or R.A.F. During four raids in July 1943, incendiary bombs destroyed 70,000 houses in Northern and Eastern Hamburg alone. In the eastern section where 700,000 people used to live all but 3 per cent. of the houses were burned down in one night. Temporary wooden structures to house 30,000, have since been built. Burgomaster Krogman added that of a pre-war population of 1,700,000 more than 1,000,000 remain in Hamburg in roofless dwellings.”—Forward, May 19th, 1945.

All this has a familiar ring especially if one shifts the location to the London dock area, where the workers dwellings were clustered around their place of work just like those of the dockers of Hamburg. It further shows how far our rulers are removed from the life of those dependent on wages, when Churchill told the German industrial workers, in a warning of heavy bombing to come to “take to the fields.” Whether the like advice was tendered to Japan’s millions by American spokesmen is not known, for according to the latest news, 5,000,000 are homeless in Tokio, while Yokohama’s docks are burnt out. British workers with over 60,000 civilians killed, can without “giving comfort to the enemy” realise what tragedy and horror the bombed workers of Japan are suffering.

The war before it became “global” was openly described as the struggle between the “haves” and the “have nots,” that is between the formation called the Axis consisting of Germany, Japan and Italy who had arrived late in the field of capitalist trade and colonies and found themselves frustrated in their national capitalistic expansion and the powers that had long ago partitioned the world into their respective spheres of influence and protected trade routes.

This naked view was soon covered by the welter of propaganda inseparable from modern war; the German workers who had known mass unemployment were told that victory would mean that they would be “swimming in fat,” while Italian and Japanese workers were told a like tale of empire and prosperity. The British Empire fell back on the time honoured “democracy and freedom,” while Russia, relied on her hastened industrialisation man-power, and aid from capitalist America.

The “ideologies” in the line-up presented some strange bed-fellows ; the Nordic “herrenvolk” whose pure Aryan stock “entitled” them to rule “lesser races,” found themselves the allies of the Latins and yellow men of Japan, while democratic Britain and America opposed Nazism as the allies of authoritarian Russia which had never known a free democratic election in her history.

Meanwhile with the Italo-German part of the Axis defeated, the victorious powers sitting at San Francisco are concerned not with any humanitarian motives, but with how their rival claims can he met without a major war breaking out between themselves.

Nor are they neglecting their preparations for such an eventuality; America has already an advanced type of “doodlebug,” while Britain’s House of Lords recently discussed the development of “novel devices.” Lord Darnley said “he visualised the possibility of the atomic bomb destroying not only humanity, but the globe on which humanity lived. The world he said must reach some general agreement to avoid these conseriuences.”

Lord Cherwell replying ended with : —

“Unless the nations could agree on some self-denying ordinance it was certain that the range and lethality of weapons would continue to increase. Unfortunately this country had most to lose by this. Our geographical advantages were rapidly diminishing. Unless and until our safety could be absolutely guaranteed by some into international organisation we must insist that we not only keep abreast of but ahead of any nation who might conceivably attack us in every scientific device. No effort should be spared to ensure this.”—Manchester Guardian, May 31st, 1945.

The noble Lords were discussing the world dilemma of how to carry on Capitalism with its trade rivalries, and territory protected by force, without wiping out humanity in the end; a problem before which capitalism stands impotent.

To-day man must either abolish capitalism or end his own existence. The forces of destruction must be struck from the hands of the capitalists and their hordes of militarists, by the workers. The workers can only effect this when armed with the knowledge of their power to end the system under which they are wage-slaves to the capitalist class. Thus in a classless society with abundance for all will the world be free from want and fear.

Frank Dawe

Our Election Manifesto and Leaflets (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

In our July issue we published our Election Manifesto. The Manifesto, three leaflets and a further statement on behalf of our candidate in North Paddington were all distributed to the voters in the constituency. We publish in this issue the three leaflets “Only Socialism will abolish War,” “Socialism and the Housing Problem,” and “Capitalism cannot cure Unemployment.”

Only Socialism Will Abolish War (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nazis Gone But War Not Abolished

Weeks have passed since Nazi Germany unconditionally surrendered yet Europe is not at peace. The newspapers are full of reports of friction between the Allied Governments at San Francisco, and trouble over the settlement of Poland, Yugo-Slavia, Austria, Syria, Greece and other countries. Mr. Anthony Eden returned from San Francisco to report in the House of Commons : “with regard to the general international situation, there is a number of serious and disquieting issues, some of them urgent.” (May 18th). Some British and American newspapers are already talking about the need to take a strong hand with Russia. The war with Germany ended on the 8th May. Within just over a week the Daily Mail which dubbed the San Francisco Conference “San Fiasco,” reported from U.S.A. that some newspapers were talking of “ultimate conflict between Russia and the Anglo-American Allies.” The Daily Mail correspondent said: “It is an astonishing phenomenon that this sort of controversy should be going on only eight days after the surrender of Germany. But it has to be faced.”—(Daily Mail, May 17th.)

In any future war, as the Minister of Production, Mr. Oliver Lyttelton, pointed oat in the House of Commons on March 22nd, 1945, it is obvious that V weapons, now in their infancy, will become more effective and more devastating. “You may be sure,” he said, “that all parts of the United Kingdom, every nook and cranny of the country, will be within range of those weapons when they are more highly developed.”

So little confidence is there that war has been abolished that there is actually discussion about the safest place to locate the new World Peace Organisation. A writer in the Daily Telegraph says: “The safest place in Europe for the World Organisation headquarters would probably be some city in the United Kingdom, not necessarily London. They would be vulnerable there to attack from the air, but less liable to capture than they would be on the European Continent.”—May 25th.. 1945.

THE CAUSE OF WARS IS CAPITALISM

The fundamental cause of wars in the modern world is the economic rivalry of the Powers, and this exists because capitalist industry in all countries has as its aim the making of profit. Manufacturers in every country are striving all the time to capture markets from each other. Governments try to gain an advantage in the trade war by taking colonies as sources of raw materials and as places where the capitalists can invest their surplus wealth. Armies, Navies and Air Forces are built up to control trade routes and strategic points all with the same purpose in view. When the French Government fought to suppress the native population in Morocco their Marshal Lyautey, who commanded the French troops, made no secret of their aim : —

“French soldiers are fighting in Morocco to acquire territory in which rise rivers capable of supplying power for electrification schemes which will prove of great advantage to French trade. . . .

“Our object is commercial and economic. The military expedition in Morocco is a means, not an end. Our object is the extension of foreign trade.”—Star, October 31st, 1922.

In the years when the present war was brewing trade rivalry was everywhere in evidence. Mr. W. M. Hughes, Australian Minister for Health, saw clearly what the outcome would be. Speaking at Brisbane in July, 1936, he said: —

“The increasing intensity of competition for economic markets must lead to armed conflict unless an economic settlement is found. This, however, is hardly to be hoped for. Talk about peace in a world armed to the teeth, is utterly futile.”—News-Chronicle, July 25th, 1936.

The London Times, October 11th, 1940, saw the same forces at work behind Germany’s aggressive policy.

“Beyond doubt one of the fundamental causes of this war has been the unrelaxing efforts of Germany since 1918 to secure wide enough foreign markets to straighten her finances at the very time when all her competitors were forced by their own war debts to adopt exactly the same course. Continuous friction was inevitable.”

SOCIALISM THE ONLY SOLUTION

The Great War, 1914-1918, was to be a war to end war. So was the present war. But the threat of war is still hanging over us. Unless capitalism is abolished and socialism established internationally in its place the same rivalries will produce further wars. All the victorious Powers are now preparing for the trade war as soon as the fighting stops. Sir Frank B. Sanderson, M.P., was only stating what is known to everyone when he said in 1941: “Britain must plan now for the post-war export trade. Peace will bring in its train fierce competition in the world’s markets and it was only by planning in advance that we should be able to hold our own.”—Daily Telegraph, July 17th, 1941.

If you want capitalism and capitalism’s wars you will vote for the capitalist candidates. If you understand that the immediate need of the human race is the establishment of socialism, under which the means of production will cease to be owned by the capitalist class and become the property of society as a whole, you will vote for the candidate of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Capitalism will produce war no matter whether the Government which administers it is Tory, Liberal, Labour, Communist or any other party.

Socialism and the Housing Problem (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Bomb Damage and The Housing Shortage

Several million houses have been damaged by bombs and rockets during the war. but the problem of slums and overcrowding did not begin with the war. There was vast overcrowding and housing shortage between the war, and before 1914. Under capitalism there has always been a housing shortage for the poor—but not for the rich. The Earl of Shaftesbury, nearly 100 years ago, was carrying on a campaign to “solve” the working-class housing problem. Speaking in the House of Lords in April, 1851, he gave figures about the deplorable housing conditions in London.

Starting in 1851, Acts of Parliament were passed and succeeding governments repeatedly inquired into the problem and promised to deal with it: but it has never been solved. A well-known housing authority, Mr. Harry Barnes, in his book, “Housing” stated that in 1911 he found “the housing position worse than at any time since 1801.”

Writing of the position in 1923. after the Great War, he said : —

“The housing shortage of to-day is not something that comes like a bolt from the blue . . . but is rather the slow accumulation of a century, suddenly and terribly increased by the conditions arising out of the war.”

The governments went on promising to build houses, but still the problem was not solved. Sir E. Simon, former Lord Mayor of Manchester, and Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health, stated in 1931 that the shortage was getting worse.

“According to all the available evidence there has on the average been no reduction whatever in the terrible overcrowding in the slum areas; the houses are steadily deteriorating; the position of the slum dwellers is worse than it was 10 years ago.” (Letter to the Times February 12th, 1931.)

PIGS BETTER HOUSED THAN WORKERS

It was in 1936, before the bombing of the present war. that Sir Benjamin Dawson, Chairman of the Bradford Central District Conservative Association, declared that his pigs were better housed than some of the workers. He examined the houses in his constituency and declared :—

“When I had finished my tour, I felt thoroughly ashamed of my country, thoroughly ashamed of the National Government, and thoroughly ashamed of the Conservative Party.

“The pigs on my farm are better housed and fed than some of the people I saw that day.”

Make no mistake about it, none of the parties of capitalism (Tory, Liberal, Labour) can solve the housing problem of the workers

LIBERAL, TORY AND LABOUR PROMISES

Since 1851, when the first Housing Act was passed, many other Acts have been introduced by Liberal and Tory Governments and by the Labour Governments which were in office 1923-24 and again in 1929-31. None of these measures have done more than touch the surface of the problem. The workers’ housing problem is not due to shortage of building materials or shortage of building workers. In 1933, for example, a quarter of the building workers were out of work. The workers endure slum dwellings, overcrowded houses, houses badly equipped and unhealthy, because they are too poor to afford anything better. The housing problem is a poverty problem. The rich are not victims of the housing shortage. All through the years of insufficient accommodation for the workers, the rich have been able to afford their spacious and luxurious houses, often having a town house and a country house as well.

RENTS AND WAGES

There is much talk of building houses to be let at rents low enough for the workers to afford, though Mr. Charles Boot, President of the Federation of Master Builders, declared early this year that houses will never again be built at pre-war prices and that rents will go up (News-Chronicle, January 12th, 1945). Even if rents do not go up, but go down, the problem will still remain. Rents fifty years ago were much lower than they are now, but there was just the same overcrowding and slums. Under capitalism the pressure of unemployment enables employers to keep wages down to the amount just about sufficient for the workers to live on. If rents are reduced, wages will fall also and still the workers will be unable to afford decent and spacious accommodation; quite apart from their worsened position when unemployed.

PREFABRICATED HOUSES

One of the remedies now offered for the housing shortage is the building of small and cheap “prefabricated” dwellings—as a temporary measure. “Temporary” is likely to become permanent and it is only the workers who are to have the “benefits” of these houses. The rich will continue to get what they can afford to pay for, as soon as the wartime control over private building is relaxed.

SOCIALISM IS THE ONLY REMEDY

Under capitalism the best housing, like the best of everything, is within the reach only of the propertied class, the owners of the land, factories, railways, etc. The working class, who own little or nothing and have to live by selling their mental and physical energies to the employers for wages, will continue to live in poor houses, and suffer discomfort and ill-health through overcrowding. Only Socialism will remedy this by making the means of production and distribution the common property of the whole community. Only then will resources be made available for building decent accommodation for all. Houses will no longer be built for profit, but solely for use.

There is no other way of solving the housing problem.

Capitalism Cannot Cure Unemployment(1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

If you vote for the Tories, the Liberals, the Labour Party or any Party which is prepared to continue the capitalist system, you are voting for unemployment, along with the rest of the ills of capitalism.

It is an insult to your intelligence to ask you to believe that any of these Parties can cure unemployment. If they could, why haven’t they done so before?

Except during wars there never has been a time when there was not unemployment, and every time capitalism lurches into one of its periodic industrial crises, unemployment mounts to staggering proportions.

Under the Liberal and Tory Governments which were in office during the nineteenth century, unemployment was continuous and at times of crisis it got worse. They always promised to abolish unemployment, but all they ever did (and that very tardily) was to make mean provision through Unemployment Insurance Acts to prevent the unemployed from starving.

Unemployment increased after the last war. It will increase again after this war.

HERE ARE THE FIGURES

Here are official figures of unemployment under various governments after the last war.

In 1921, under Lloyd George’s Tory-Liberal Coalition Government, unemployment rose to over 2,500,000. Nearly one in four of the insured workers were out of work.

In January, 1924, under MacDonald’s Labour Government, unemployment was 1,374,206.

Under the Tory Government in January, 1928, it was 1,260,503.

Under the Second Labour Government, in January, 1931, it rose to 2,662,842.

In January, 1933, under the National Government, it was 2,955,448.

PLENTY OF WORK AFTER THE WAR

The spokesmen of the capitalist parties tell you there won’t be unemployment because of the need to repair the destruction caused by the war. They told you the same after the last war.

Speaking about the period after the present war, Mr. A. S. Comyns Carr, K.C., made the following pronouncement: —

“He believed that the problem of post-war unemployment did not exist. On the contrary, the problem of employment after the war was going to be how to find enough people to do the work.” (Speech reported in the Times, March 8th, 1943.)

Exactly the same fallacious promise was made after the last war by Mr .J. R. Clynes, one of the Labour leaders, who was a Minister in the Lloyd George war-time Coalition Government. He said : —

“If there ever was a risk of over-production, causing unemployment, there is none now. For at least a dozen years there must be conditions of shortage which, with the best energy and effort, cannot be removed. We are in arrears. We need have no fear of the supply exceeding the demands.”—(Reynolds Newspaper, November 30th, 1919.)

At the time Mr. Clynes made his statement, unemployment was 500,000. By the middle of 1921, less than, two years later, it was over 2,000,000. Then it declined but remained well over 1,000,000 until the crisis of 1931 when it slumped to record levels.

This will happen again if the working class continues to vote for the candidates of the capitalist parties.

WHY UNEMPLOYMENT

Under capitalism, goods are not produced solely for use (as they will be when you decide to vote for Socialism). They are produced for profit. If the manufacturer cannot make a profit, he curtails production or else he tries to cut his costs by reducing wages or installing “labour-saving” machinery. Either way the result is the same—unemployment. The capitalists of all countries are always striving to capture markets from each other. It is impossible for them all to sell their products at a profit because the wages received by the workers are not sufficient to buy the great quantities of goods produced by modern mass-production methods.

RAISING WAGES IS NO SOLUTION

The Labour Party claims that higher wages is the solution (though when they were in office in 1931 they cut the wages of government employees and allowed employers generally to do the same). The Tory Lord Beaverbrook now puts forward the same empty policy. His newspaper, the Sunday Express, May 27th, 1945, reports him as follows: —

“His policy for the abolition of unemployment was to raise the standard of living in every country in the world by international agreement, so as to increase the consumption of goods.”

In the first place, there is not the slightest possibility of effective international agreement to raise wages. Even the Allied Governments, within a week of the ending of the war with Germany, were demonstrating their inability to agree with each other on all sorts of problems about European governments and frontiers. Even if they did put their signatures to some pions declaration, it could never he enforced. Every worker knows that in times of bad trade many employers are able to force individual workers to accept less than agreed rates of wages, even in industries such as agriculture where the minimum is supposed to lie enforced by law. In face of an international agreement to enforce higher wages, some countries would simply ignore it and employers everywhere would protest that they could not afford it. International agreement to reduce wages is a much more likely eventuality.

Note, too, that Lord Beaverbrook, who for years opposed any kind of international agreements and backed his policy of Empire isolation, now talks of international action !

But the basic fallacy of the whole policy is that agreements about wages leave untouched a major cause of unemployment, the introduction of labour-saving machinery. At all times, employers are scheming to get the same output with fewer workers, by introducing new machinery and more efficient methods. During the war this has been enormously speeded up. Coal, cotton and agriculture are three of many industries in which new machinery and methods are going to displace hundreds of thousands of workers. It is estimated that “British agriculture should have no difficulty in producing half as much again as it did before the war with a substantially smaller labour force paid at twice the pre-war rates.”—Manchester Guardian, May 15th, 1945.

How will international wage agreements find work for these armies of redundant workers?

SOCIALISM THE ONLY REMEDY

Capitalism cannot exist without unemployment, without the exploitaion of the workers and without trade rivalry with foreign capitalists. Capitalism will go on producing unemployment, crises and wars. It makes no difference whether the Government which administers capitalism is Tory, Liberal, Labour, Common Wealth or Communist. Only Socialism will solve the problem. Through the international action of the working class of all lands capitalism must be abolished and Socialism established in its place. Then the means of production will be owned and democratically controlled by the whole community. Production for profit, trade rivalry and unemployment will be no more. Goods will be produced by the co-operative efforts of all the able-bodied population and will be available freely to meet the needs of all.

Increased production will result not in unemployment, but in increased consumption and greater leisure.

North Paddington Election (1945)

Party News from the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Voting Figures were as follows: —

Mason MacFarlane (Labour)              . . .      16,638

Brendan Bracken (Conservative)        . . .      10,093

Groves (S.P.G.B.)                                . . .           472

By The Way: Atrocities (1945)

The By The Way Column from the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Atrocities

As atrocities seem to be of great interest, just now, the “Socialist Standard” has pleasure in giving evidence of other atrocities to which the attention of Parliament and the Press might he called, besides the Horror Camp in Germany.

First a report from the Manchester Guardian, of Famine Enquiry Commission headed by Sir John Woodhead, Acting Governor of Bengal, 1934-1939).

   “After considering all the circumstances (it is stated), we cannot avoid the conclusion that it lay in the power of the Government of Bengal by bold, resolute and well-conceived measures at the right time to have largely prevented the tragedy of the famine as it actually took place. The Government of India failed to recognise at a sufficiently early date the need for a system of planned movement of food grains, including rice as well as wheat, from surplus to deficit provinces and states.”—(Manchester Guardian, May 8th, 1945).

The Guardian continues: —

“Enormous Profits”   But the public in Bengal, or at least certain sections of it, are also held to have their share of blame. Reference is made to the “atmosphere of fear and greed which, in the absence of control, was one of the causes of the rapid rise in the price-level,” and the report adds: “Enormous profits were made out of the calamity, and in the circumstances profits for some meant death for others. A large part of the community lived in plenty while others starved., and there was much indifference in the face of suffering. Corruption was widespread throughout the provinces and in many classes of society.”
   “A million and a half of the poor of Bengal fell victims to circumstances for which, they themselves were not responsible. Society, together with its organs, failed to protect its weaker members; indeed, there was a moral and a social breakdown as well as an administrative breakdown.
  “By August, 1943, it was clear that the Provincial Administration in Bengal was failing to control the famine. Deaths and mass migration on a large scale were occurring. In such circumstances the Government of India, whatever the constitutional position, must share with the Provincial Government the responsibility of saving lives.”

Second the following report of the worst air raid of the war on Hamburg on July 23th-26th, when the city “ceased to exist.”

   Twenty thousand Germans died and 60,000 were taken to hospital after one R.A.F. raid on Hamburg on the night of July 25-26, 1943, when the greatest firebomb inferno raged throughout the centre of the dock area. It lay waste the equivalent of three London boroughs.
     Official sources state that German air raid precaution statistics confirm these figures.
   That night fire-bombs set light to the dock warehouses and installations in the dock areas covered by the three suburbs Hammerbrook, St. Georg, and Borgfeldt.
   The heat of the fires, which lasted several days, was so fierce that several fruit trees produced blossom again and the oxygen became so rarifled by the heat that people died from suffocation.
    This was probably the worst air raid of the war. The total of casualties caused by Allied forces in their raids on the port is said to be 250,000, and of these it is estimated that 50,000 were killed. - - (Sunday Despatch, May 13th, 1945).

#    #    #    #

The Old, Old Story

Lord Beaverbrook has delivered himself of his awe-inspiring thoughts for the future prosperity of the nation in a speech at Bradford. According to his own paper, the Sunday Express, May 27, it is the “Way to a better Britain.” “Full work and high wages.” "How are we to have full employment”? he asks and answers “by setting a high standard of life for the people.” It’s as simple as that! A little more detail? “By satisfying the demand of the home market the output is built up and as the output is built up the costs of production are reduced. When the costs of production are reduced sufficiently then it is simple and easy to find foreign markets.”

Just like that! “The first export market I wish to seek is the export of an idea—the export of the standard of living to other countries, too.”

Whether this is to include Germany, Austria, Italy, Japan, etc., the noble lord did not say. Or even India, where a million died of famine last year.

“The Government should take part in such policy on two principles. The first is that the Governments of the world should meet together.” (Shades of the ill-starred World Economic Conference of 1933). Well, they’ve been doing this for several hundred years, now—they might as well go on, “for the purpose of setting the standards of living high enough and strong enough to provide work for every man.” The second principle should be that when there is a decline in employment, not only in Britain but in every country that is a party to the agreement providing for higher standards of life, that decline should be met by a rising scale of wages. A rising scale of wages will check the evil of Unemployment by providing increased buying power.”—(Sunday Express, May 27).

Which means: Increase output to cheapen cost of production to find foreign markets—BUT the Governments are to agree to increase wages when unemployment spreads throughout the world to “increase buying power.”

Why it will be necessary to find foreign markets with cheaper products his lordship does not say.

If it were possible to enable the workers to buy back even a large part of their produce, why not do it here?

If the policy will work, HOW does Beaverbrook KNOW that there is going to be a “decline in employment” throughout the world?

And do we have to have a decline in employment first so that the Government can “raise wages”?

Actually, Governments can no more “raise” wages, than they could raise the dead.

In a falling market after the war, the Government which tried to raise wages would “fall” quicker than the wages.

The intelligent workers are becoming more tired than ever of the “raise the standard of living” rubbish, started by Lloyd George and the Liberals in 1910, repeated by the Labour Leaders, 1919, and in “Socialism and the Living Wage” of the I.L.P. (1926), and by the Social Credit chumps of 1932.

Apart from the absurdity of proposing to call Conferences of the Governments of the world, immediately after sacrificing thousands to destroy half of them for five years, “cheapening cost of production” to “capture foreign markets” is reduction of Relative Wages—and however many “friendly” conferences are held, leads inevitably to WAR.

Wages are the price of labour-power. Prices fall in a condition of ample supply and falling demand—“when Johnny comes marching home again.”

The echoes of the last shots are still reverberating around the world. Millions are still in the modern mass concentration camp known as the “Forces.” And all this “great brain” of the Tory Party can offer is “the mixture as before”; bidding the exploited worker, like a blue bottle on the window-pane, after having fought his master’s battle—to restart his painful and arduous attempt to crawl into the sunlight—only to crash once again into the abyss of poverty he longs to escape.

Horatio.

More Mechanisation (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Authors such as H. G. Wells and Jules Verne were at one time laughed at by their critics as cranks and eccentrics. Both Wells and Verne wrote prolifically of rocket propulsion, and Wells in particular wrote of robots doing the work of men. From the capitalist point of view this would be an ideal state of affairs. The workers now are troublesome fellows. They have to to fed and housed and this tends to draw upon the profits of the capitalist-class. They have to be educated too in order to do their complicated jobs and this has its disadvantages in that they do not stop, but go on learning. In order to counteract this millions of pounds have to be spent annually upon propaganda to keep them in order.

In the past when production has had to be speeded up, machinery has been introduced and human labour reduced. Sometimes the workers who are left go on strike and production is held up while tedious concessions are made. How much more convenient it would be if the work were done by robots. They would have no feelings and could be switched on and off at will, but these treacherous workers demand reductions in their hours of work; and there are some who even have the audacity to spend their leisure hours working for the overthrow of capitalism and the dispossession of their masters.

June 1944 was a month in which the Flying bomb made its debut. Later on we were threatened by rockets. The critics, bigoted as ever, pooh-poohed the idea. The following autumn the series of mysterious bangs were announced as the "impossible" rocket. Once more the critics and experts were confounded.

The war which has just reached its conclusion has greatly advanced all forms of rocket and jet propulsion, and in a press interview recently one of Britain's lending aircraft manufacturers, Sir Frederick Handley-Page, advanced some very interesting views. In answer to one question he stated that the rocket is the product of a nation short of manpower. He wont on to say : —

   “A man by the time he has reached the age of 21 and been trained as a soldier has expended 180,000 man-hours of his existence, and this is spread over 21 calendar years with no known way of shortening the time. At least 21 years are required if the shortage of man-power is to be made good."—Sunday Express, April 8th.

Here is a hint that future wars are expected and that men must be reared to fight. How fortunate for the capitalists that someone has thought of family-allowances and raising the birth-rate. Could it he that this is what our rulers have in mind?

One cannot fail to realise what Sir Frederick had in mind when he made his statement referring to the 180,000 hours of existence. He meant that with the present inaccuracies of the rocket adjusted it will he possible to have much bigger and more devastating wars in a shorter space of time. Modern production can turn out rockets in enormous profusion. There is no need to wait for men to grow up. In the meantime we can observe the intense international strife. The seeds which will germinate into the next war.

Instead of allowing ourselves to be the tools of the master-class; to be housed in hovels, bred, fed and buried cheaply, slaughtered on battle-fields, packed into factories or superseded by machines we must take control of the world's resources ourselves and use them for our own comfort and advantage.

Chester.

Editorial: A World That Changes But Remains The Same (1945)

Editorial from the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Since the war cloud has lifted from Europe another cloud has descended which is slowly smothering the bright promises with which the fighters' and the sufferers were fed. The golden and futile promises of war time are giving place to the ugly realities of capitalist peace.

How often was it declaimed on platform and in print that Germany as a nation must be utterly shattered so that wars would come no more. The figment that wars were the product of people with a foul and brutal urge to dominate was spread and fostered to conceal the fact that wars are a product of economic conditions, and in the modern world, the product solely of capitalist conditions. How often was it urged that the United Nations, with high and unblemished ideals, were solidly united on basic principles that would exclude future wars and would bless their peoples with peace, comfort and security!

How soon the lie has been given to this hypocritical moonshine. French interests in the Levant struggling to keep their hands on oil; Russia pursuing its imperialist policy in Manchuria, the Dardanelles, Tangier; America striving for control of air lines; Britain, the older bandits, conniving for its share in the swag wrung from the surplus labour of the workers. Here is an example of the spirit that animates the class that rules us!

   “The Canadian Pacific Railway Company have made a flying start in the post-war shipping race, aimed at giving Britain the lead, by ordering four crack 10,000 ton ships from a Glasgow yard.”—(Evening News, July 7th, 1945).

This is just one sprint in the race that leads to more wars. Another was the report of an interview with Lord Nuffield in the Daily Express (May 25ih, 1945). The report is headed “Nuffield is out to beat foreigners” and it referred to the £ 1,000,000 car company he is starting in Australia.

     “I have started the Australian company because I know that if we do not go in there in a big way others— and I mean foreign competitors—will get in first.”
    “By the time the Empire countries are ready to make cars entirely on their own it may well be that air transport will have developed to such an extent that we shall no longer talk of exporting goods from Britain to Australia.”
   “If people want cars at anything like the 1939 price, will they make the Government cancel the purchase tax? Will they give us cheaper steel? (That means more and cheaper coal). And will they he content with wage rates below an inflationary level.”

The sting is in the last line. The attack on wages is beginning and the workers are about to reap the harvest of the better world for which they fought—hard work and lower wages.

The Daily Express, June 2nd, 1945, reports discussions between Russia and Turkey which should give those who put faith in the protestations of peace and justice something to ponder over. After pointing out that Salim Sarpor, Turkey’s Ambassador, is on his way to Moscow with Turkey’s answer to the proposals Russia made that Turkey give up control of the Dardanelles, revise Turkey’s North East Frontier Provinces, and democratise the Turkish constitution, the Daily Express reporter goes on;

   “Turkey says ‘Yes’ in principle to all three. But she wants them postponed, not through insincerity, but to give an air of negotiation to concessions she knows she must make (italics ours).

That last bit is a specimen of what “small nations,” whose rights have been held up as a corner stone of the future, may expect from their poweiful competitors.

One of the idolised leaders of the Allies, General Smuts, on leaving the San Francisco Conference issued this warning:

   “We buried our arms last time. One of the most potent causes of World War No. 2, was this illusion that there would be no more war. . . . Europe, a fragmented and broken-up continent filled with people glaring at each other with hate, is the greatest problem now facing mankind.
    “The most awful calamity in history has overtaken Europe. Don't ask me who is the enemy I don't know. It may be ourselves.
    “We do not know what is going to breed out of this war. Forces that have been kept under by civilization are now unchained.”—(Daily Mail, June 30th, 1945).

Such is the bright prospect before us!

Finally secret diplomacy, which is the very essence of this exploiting system under which we live, extends to the Berlin Conference of the “Big Three” which is to decide the future of Germany—and other very important carve-ups.

   “It was officially, confirmed to London last night that reporters will not be admitted to the Big Three meeting at Potsdam. Communiques will be issued.”— (Daily Express, July 7th, 1945).

What a joke on all the perishing freedoms we redd about in the Atlantic Charter and elsewhere!

It is still the old world in which the capitalist lives like a leech upon our industry and our only hope of a future free from poverty, insecurity and war is the determination of the workers to abolish the conditions that produce this state of affairs—the private ownership of the means of living. It is not the leeches we object to but the way they have of getting their living.

A Shadow Falls Across the Capitalist World (1945)

From the August 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Election Campaign is over and the votes have been cast. For the first time in the history of this country a party of working men and women has put forward a delegate for parliament on one issue alone—to capture the powers of government for the sole purpose of dispossessing the capitalist class of their ownership of the means of production and establishing Socialism in place of the present social order. At our meetings we stressed the fact that voters who were not in favour of this sweeping revolution should not vote for our delegate. We also stressed our opposition to reform policies and pointed out that we could do nothing for the workers: that Socialism was something the workers must accomplish themselves, understanding what they were after and using the Socialist Party as their instrument; for this purpose. Our opponents at North Paddington were the Tory and Labour parties.

Over the years we have been told that if we wait until the workers understand Socialism we would have to wait hundreds of years. As workers we repudiated this sneer at the intelligence of our class. We were told we were armchair philosophers, and twitted with the phrase “The Small Party of Good Boys.” Our reply has always been that our case is clear, direct and simple and is the only one in the interests of the workers. Consequently the workers will listen to us when we have sufficient means at our disposal to make a concentrated attack to arouse the workers interest.

Events have shown how right we were. For many years members and sympathisers have been contributing to our election fund. As we are only working men and women it has been a slow and painful process. Our principal obstacle was the £150 deposit required; not even a mole hill to our opponents, with their rich supporters, but a veritable alpine wall across our path. Just before the war we had collected enough to venture on the campaign and we put forward a prospective candidate, but the outbreak of war deferred the general election. When we learnt that there was to be a general election this year we decided to take part. We appointed a Parliamentary Committee who planned and, with the assistance of the Propaganda and other Committees, carried through the campaign. We decided to contest North Paddington and nominated a delegate to go forward as our candidate. Then we rolled up our sleeves and waded in, throwing all the strength we had into the contest.

We had no “National figures,” with or without cigars, to dangle before the electors, nor had we any national newspapers to bamboozle them We wanted neither. Instead we had the best of all weapons, the only solution to working class poverty and misery, and working class brains, energy and enthusiasm with which to put it forward. In the few short weeks at our disposal a campaign was planned and carried through that our opponents, who had neither the conviction nor the sincerity that inspired us, were unable to equal.

We got out leaflets explaining our case in detail and members and sympathisers came straight from work (sometimes involving long journeys) to the committee rooms to spend hours writing  100,000 addresses, folding leaflets, printing posters and doing many other jobs. Others organised or spoke at the numerous meetings arranged in the constituency. Meetings were advertised by a loud speaker van, by sticking up 1,700 posters in every available spot and by chalking the roads at suitable places.

Our Manifesto and four other statements explaining the Socialist position were rent to the 34,000 voters in the constituency, and the manifesto to the 1,000 services voters. Men and women members and sympathisers were out every night canvassing and selling literature. They succeeded in covering over half the houses in the constituency spending much time discussing our ease. Every house in the constituency was visited four times by helpers to deliver leaflets or hand-bills. Everyone worked hard and took a joy in what they were doing. No one worried about whether the work was dirty or clean, for they were working for themselves, helping to clean out the dirty stable of capitalism.

And now, looking back, we have the satisfaction of knowing that the planning and the execution were well and truly done.

What response did we get to our efforts? There is only one word the present writer can think of that describes it—amazing! Our case was put forward everywhere without trimmings, just as we have put it forward for 41 years. We held two Sunday night-meetings at the Metropolitan Music Hall, Harrow Road. On each occasion the theatre was packed with two thousand people. These meetings lasted for over three hours during which interesting questions were put to our speakers by the audience. A weeknight meeting was held at the Porchester Hall which was attended by about 600 people.

One night Churchill turned up at the Prince of Wales, Paddington, to give his usual dose of opium. He did not get an enthusiastic reception. After he left our speakers held two large meetings. When it commenced to rain one of the speakers invited his audience to adjourn to the little Emmanuel Hall where about 300 of them packed it out and gave our speaker not only un attentive hearing, but an enthusiastic one as he answered their questions for nearly two hours.

At the beginning of the campaign our audiences were small but as they learnt more about our principles and policy they commenced to flock to the meetings.

The striking thing about all our meetings has been the orderliness and attentiveness of the audiences, and their genuine interest in Socialism as evidenced by the direct and interesting questions they asked.

Our audiences were composed of working men and woman of all kinds and yet they were sufficiently interested and appreciative of our case to contribute £55 to the collections at the first large meeting, £67 to the second, and £23 to the third. Collections have been taken up at indoor and outdoor meetings and a considerable amount of literature has been purchased. Those who came to the Emmanuel Hall meeting on the night of the Churchillian frost contributed nearly £7 to the collection.

Before each of the three large indoor meetings referred to above we put up posters inviting our two opponents to put their case from our platform in opposition to us, and repeated the invitation from the platform but neither of them turned up. They had the opportunity of speaking to 2,000 electors at the cost neither of effort nor expense, hut neither Mr. Brendan Bracken nor Lieut.-General Mason Macfarlane took advantage of this grand opportunity! Why? In our view because they funked it. They had not sufficient faith in their case, or in the response of the workers to it.

We started this election campaign with an election fund of £300. In the course of the campaign we have collected sufficient to enable us to spend another £300.

On the eve of polling day about 1,000 people were present at an outdoor meeting at the Prince of Wales, which lasted from 8 o'clock until after midnight.

All this shows that, whatever the size of the vote for Socialism this time, the workers are at last turning away from the sterile policies that have befogged them and left them in the ditch for so long, and are now willing to listen to the case for Socialism.

When one realises that this happened in the one little corner of England that our meagre resources enabled us to tackle it shows what a tremendous response there would be to our case if we could put in the same amount of work everywhere. But be it understood that this is only the beginning. Next time the volume of our challenge will be far greater.

Yes, the tide is beginning to turn at last. The workers are on the scent of the source of their slavery. Let the ruling class tremble at this portent of the coming flood which will sweep privilege and class rule from the earth for ever.

Gilmac.