Artists and and “Fighting Age”. A Socialist’s Comments. (1917)

From the September 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

“Many of the artists, like Mr. Edgar Bundy, Mr. A. T. Nowell, Mr. J. R. K. Duff, and Mr. Wynne Apperley, continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging. If an artist is not of the fighting age it is difficult to suggest anything better for him to do.”—A. J. Finberg in “The Star.”

The above gem of reflection has been carefully preserved ever since it was culled from “The Star” for its unconscious humour and its twisted philosophy. It evoked laughter then, and has since. In an unguarded moment the critic has unwittingly revealed himself, and incidentally, the working of the mind of many others. Let us examine it from the point of view thus expressed, and then from a Socialist’s.

The art critic is evidently rather surprised, and slightly shocked. “What would happen if everyone stayed at home, like you?” (as the hoardings had it) is the question he mentally asks. The artists “continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging. If an artist is not of the fighting age it is difficult to suggest anything better for him to do.”

Evidently the main idea in Mr. Fineberg’s mind is, “Get on with the War !” If you are an artist of the “fighting age” then GO he would say ; he thinks the paramount purpose is the prosecution of the war. But if you are not of the “fighting age,” Mr. Finberg finds it difficult to suggest to the artists anything better than the pursuit of their art. Ye gods !—it is difficult. A very little frankness goeth a very long way. Let us see the logical effect of this argument.

Evidently, at the present juncture, when central Europe has been turned into a series of vast cemeteries through millions of peaceful workers, having been compelled by their masters to maim and destroy each other, the all-important thing in pro-war people’s minds is the continuance of War ! Like Lloyd George, they want to win the war ! But “there are some more concerned about ending the war than about winning it.” (Lloyd George at Queen’s Hall, Aug. 4, 1917). Yes, there certainly are ; and what is of supreme importance, there are some very much more concerned with preventing future wars by abolishing root and branch the present system that produces them than with winning this one.

The great motto for the workers should be “Let us mind our own business” ! Had the workers of Europe “continued their work” when their masters—the war-creating class—declared war, and told their rulers “To hell with you and your wars: go fight it amongst yourselves” ! then, truly, there would have been no war. It would have been stayed at the onset by “the men who stayed at home.”

Oh for class conscious solidarity of the workers, with the one aim of capturing political power, and with one goal : International Socialism ! Lacking those they have become the dupes and pawns of those who exploit and oppress then. Cajoled, deceived and driven like sheep, they have confused their own interests with their masters’. So Europe finds itself to-day in a sanguinary welter of racial hate and fratricide, with smiling fields turned into a desolate arena by the most hellish warfare the world has ever seen.

The demand for men of “fighting age” has been colossal. The glory of young manhood, its health and vigour, has been incessantly sought by the master class. The peremptory call for men to destroy their capitalist-made enemies has been enormous. All the fine qualities, and abilities to do things worth doing, have been spurned as of no worth: to be a soldier was the all in all. The world will never know what men of talent, of genius, who probably would have contributed their quota in the realms of Art and Literature, Poetry and Science, have, through their masters’ orgy of futile organised slaughter, been crushed and destroyed in the ruthless progress of the “Great War.” It is indeed a tragedy for the individuals and for Humanity also. Militarism is in truth the valet of capitalism ! Everything has been subjugated to the needs of capitalism’s brute force. “No sacrifice,” they told us, was “too great when honour and liberty were at stake.” The “honour” and “liberty” of plutocratic thieves ! Many of the men above “fighting age” have also “done their bit,” for have they not goaded others to go ? Have not some of them sat on Tribunals and “administered” the Military Service Act ?

Where also should we have been if all the art critics had joined up? The artists, free from their attentions would be at a loss, and the Press would find it somewhat difficult to fill its columns with stereotyped art-jargon in their absence, and the art-gallery proprietors would not have their shows boomed quite so much.

To a Socialist it is pleasant to know that certain artists “continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging.” The spirit of Art and that of the Warrior are frankly antagonistic. One is creative and contemplative ; the other is destructive, and thinks in terms of force. When Socialism becomes the established system of society, then, and not till then, will the workers of the world have abundant opportunity to do the work they wish, and as a “labour of love,” no matter what it be, whether expressing themselves in poetry, prose, or paint, or shaping their dreams of beauty in metal or in the marble of Carrara, or in seeking by scientific research to alleviate human pain. Then war will be a thing of the uncivilised past. Men will work for the World’s Commonwealth. Men of “fighting age” will not be considered from as potential warriors, but will be considered from the view-point of usefulness to humanity !

That is the crux of the position. “Warriors”! is all the cry to-day—”Men, Money and Munitions”! “Men, and yet more men”!—production for ultimate destructive purposes.

All this, workers, is the outcome of this system of producing for private profit. Every thing goes into the melting pot when the capitalists’ interests are at stake. No matter what your abilities are or your skill in any sphere of work, when capital calls you to fight in its own hellish wars you have to respond, and if necessary, make “the supreme sacrifice”—your very life !

Workers, organise class-consciously for the capture of the political machine and the establishment of Socialism to end these things once and for all.

Yours is the power and the ultimate victory ! The emancipation of mankind from the thraldom of the present system of wage slavery will result.

You desire peace ? You wish to abolish warfare? You as a class can alone end it for ever by your concerted efforts: by establishing INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM under which the means of the world’s wealth-production will be in the hands of and controlled by the Workers of the World, for the benefit of the multitudes of all nations.

G.

Notes by the Way: What Mussolini did for Italy (1935)

The Notes by the Way Column from the October 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

What Mussolini did for Italy

 

Here is a brief description of the lofty principles on which the Fascist Government has trained its boys and young men, under the guise of “education."

There minds have been saturated with bellicose sentiments. The word Fatherland has lost for them its meaning, apparently obsolete, of love for the native land and its inhabitants, and has come to signify a proud and pugnacious attitude to the foreigner. While they were still boys the rifle and the machine-gun were put into their hands. All their Sundays were spent in military exercises. In their elementary school they were taught from a State text-book in which the martial virtues were exalted as the best virtues of a citizen. Indeed, later on they were taught that the citizen in Italy is from 6 to 60 a soldier, and that Italy, in the words of the chief of Fascism, must be a “military, militaristic, and warlike nation." (Times, September 5th.)

* * *

 

Capitalist Crisis and Capitalist War

 

Sir George Paish, in a letter to the Press, recently drew attention to an aspect of the Abyssinian conflict which has received little notice, that is the similarity between the condition of Italy now and in 1896, when also war was waged on Abyssinia.

"At that time the world was suffering from a severe economic and financial crisis, and the distress of Italy caused her statesmen to seek relief in a policy of conquest. The world to-day is suffering from a crisis more severe than 40 years ago, and Italy is in even greater distress than she was then. In consequence, Italy desires a colony to give her a market for her products, to which her people can emigrate, and from which she can obtain food, raw material, and gold .... economic and financial distress is the real cause of the difficulty.” (Times, August 31st.)

Here we have from a world-famed economist, who hopes and believes that capitalism can and should be saved, a fairly frank admission that capitalism is at the root of modern wars.

* * *

 

The Rate of Increase of Output in Industry

 

The rash speculations of Douglasites and others about a supposed vast and rapid increase of output in industry, due to the introduction of improved machinery and processes, have received additional refutation in a survey of output in the Economic Journal (September, 1935), by Ely Devons, of the Economic Research Section, Victoria University of Manchester. Basing his survey on the census of production and other material, he finds that the increase of output per head of the workers in all manufacturing industry in this country increased by at least 14 per cent. in the six years from 1924 to 1930. He thinks the actual figure will be somewhat larger than 14 per cent. for reasons given in the article. Making a reasonable allowance for this, it will be seen that the increase per annum is rather less than 3 per cent.

Taking the smaller range of industries which are covered by the Board of Trade’s index of production he finds that the increase of output per head of the workers actually in work was 20 per cent., or a little more, in the nine years 1924—1933. This gain is well below 3 per cent. a year.

These estimates agree with others given in the Socialist Standard from time to time.

* * *

 

The Output in Mining and Iron and Steel

 

A writer in Forward (August 24th), who shares the misconception that productivity increases at a “tremendous” rate, gives figures relating to coal-mining, an industry in which a great deal of machinery has been introduced. He claims that after allowing for the big reduction in the total output of coal, for the decrease in the number of miners, and for the greater amount of short time, output per head has increased by 30.4 per cent. in the ten years 1923—1933. Even if this were the whole story the increase each year would still be less than 3 per cent. of the previous year's output. Actually, however, it leaves out of account any additional labour used up in the manufacture and maintenance, etc., of the machines, also the fact that, the output per head in 1923 represented a big decrease, as compared with 1913 (from 260 tons a year to 229 tons).

 

On the other hand, miners’ hours of work are shorter than before the War.

 

If these modifications are allowed for it will be seen that miners’ output per head now as compared with that in 1913 has increased at the outside by not much more than 2 per cent. a year. The rate of increase in recent years may have been somewhat larger, but much of this has merely made up for the previous decline in output due, among other causes, to the fact that coal becomes more difficult to get at as the mines become more worked out.

 

An estimate of the increase of productivity in engineering, shipbuilding and iron and steel, based on the index of output published by the Royal Economic Society, and on the number of workers actually at work in these trades, shows that output per head between 1924 and 1930 increased by about 3 per cent. a year.

 

* * *

 

Major Douglas puts his Cards on the Table

There is certainly one thing for which Major Douglas deserves praise, that is for his very definite statement of his attitude towards the Alberta Social Credit Government. He might, had he wished, have expressed vague and qualified approval without committing himself to anything definite. Instead, in an article in the Sunday Express, he stated in plain language exactly what he believes the Alberta experiment will produce. As we know that the application of the Douglas theories will fail to achieve the results Major Douglas anticipates, it is a suitable occasion to place on record what he wrote in the Sunday Express on September 1st, 1935. The following passages are extracted from the article in question:

Mr. Aberhart, the new Prime Minister, is a man of magnetic personality and a magnificent orator. In the heat of the election he went rather beyond any proposals that I have made, but it is entirely false to say that I am in disagreement with him, I admire him greatly (Italics ours.)

He promised during the election to pay every Albertan five pounds a month. I hope and believe that once his plans are in full operation that figure will be substantially increased.

If the credit of a rich province is made fully available to its people without artificial restrictions of any kind, there will be no poverty. Everyone will have enough to eat, a decent home, opportunities for recreation and adequate leisure.

That, I believe, will happen in Alberta if the new Government sticks to its policy. It will probably take fifteen months before the plan is in full operation, and that fifteen months will be a period of great difficulty and bitter strife. The vested interests of the bankers and financiers will not relinquish their monopoly without a hard struggle.

In 15 months from now, I believe that Alberta will be a blessed land. Unemployment will no longer be a menace to its citizens. No wheat will rot in its elevators. Fine new roads will enable tourists to appreciate its magnificent scenery and bring further wealth to its people.

It will become one of the show places of the world.

 

* * *

 

Capitalism and Superior Brains

 

Ousted from one position after another, defenders of capitalism finally fell back on the “superior brains." The capitalist, we are told, provides all the brain-power, the ideas, the organising skill and directive ability. His was the creative genius, without which the wage and salary earners would be floundering about in muddle and chaos.

The creative geniuses of capitalism finally produced the world war and the world crisis and, in passing, they turned whole counties of Great Britain into distressed areas, where idle men and idle mills rotted together. And what about the "superior brains" meanwhile? Having produced the chaotic conditions, are they setting to work to produce a remedy? By no means. Instead, the Chairman of the Whitehead Iron & Steel Co., Ltd., of Newport, Monmouth, is offering a prize of £1,000, with additional prizes of £200 for practical suggestions for “permanently and substantially reducing existing distress in South Wales and Monmouthshire (Daily Telegraph, August 31st).

You send your answers to the Industrial Development Council of South Wales. We know the answer, but we fear nobody will receive a prize for sending it in.

 

* * *

 

"200 Companies Own Half U.S."

 

Under the above heading the Star (August 3rd) publishes a report from Reuter's Agency, stating that, according to the American Bar Association, about 200 Corporations, managed by approximately 1,000 directors, own one-half of the wealth of the United States. These 200 corporations do not include banks.

“A small number of corporations exercise a dominant influence over price control and trade practices, and virtually control the production and distribution of the country,"  a report by the Association states.

Edgar Hardcastle

The Passing Show: The Psychologist (1962)

The Passing Show Column from the September 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Psychologist

 

Psychology has the answer to all the world’s problems. If only we all became psychologists, if only we all studied psychology and learned to understand the hidden springs of each other’s actions, then the difficulties and injustices of society would all melt away.

No doubt psychology has its part to play in the modern world, at least under capitalism. Certainly many individuals have been and can be helped by psychiatric treatment. But, wars, exploitation, poverty, and unemployment, arise not from any defects in man which could be cured by psychology; they arise from capitalism, and the resulting break-up of society into irreconcilable classes.

If you don’t believe that, you may care to reflect on conditions in what is perhaps the only country in the world which has a psychologist at the head of affairs. It is the near-Fascist republic of South Africa. Dr. Verwoerd, the Prime Minister, is a former Professor of Applied Psychology at Stellenbosch University. But the people of South Africa are not any better off for that. Dr. Verwoerd is the representative of the ruling landed and farming class of South Africa, and he and his Government run the country in the interests of that class. The fact that he is also one of the country’s leading psychologists makes no difference whatever to conditions in South Africa.

Mosley

Whatever may be the right way to deal with Mosley, to go along to his meetings and knock him down is merely foolishness. Firstly, it gives him and his party country-wide publicity in press, radio and television. Secondly, it is resorting to the very weapon—violence—that Fascists and Nazis prefer above all others. Violence is what they plan for, what they train for, what they hope for. To reduce political argument to the level of people knocking each other down in the street is to descend to methods which the Fascists and Nazis would probably use better than any others. As for Socialism, violence is totally irrelevant, even if there were no other objection to it; for the establishment of Socialism depends on an educated working class, which really understands what goes on in the world. Our weapons are argument, knowledge, and reason. Anyone with an understanding of the Socialist case would have no difficulty in pricking Mosley’s bubble.

Race-hatred

Equally irrelevant is the measure now proposed by some MPs of all three large parties to ban incitement to race-hatred. Acts of Parliament cannot kill ideas. If the ruling class of this country decided to bring in the Fascist form of capitalism, or a near-totalitarian system such as our rulers introduced in the last war, no Act of Parliament could stop them. It has been said before, but it will bear repeating, that the only sure safeguard against Fascism is the establishment of Socialism.

In fact, many of those now agitating for a Bill “against race-hatred” were in the forefront of affairs in the last war, writing articles and making speeches which had the single aim of inciting race-hatred against the Germans, Italians, and Japanese. If such a law as they now propose had been in existence from 1939 to 1945, they themselves would have been its most frequent transgressors. And in any future war, whether “conventional” or nuclear, we shall (if there is time) have to listen to the usual flood of propaganda inciting race-hatred against the Russians, or whoever the “enemy” happens to be. And any law there may be which makes incitement to race-hatred illegal will either be repealed or ignored by our rulers.

Militarism

This war-time propaganda is, of course, intended for us, the workers, only; it is hard to believe that the ruling classes of the world fool themselves. For example, the Anglo-American line in the last war was that the Germans and the Japanese were incurably militaristic, that they loved uniforms, drilling, and fighting, and that they rushed into the army at the least opportunity. This, we were told, was one of the “real reasons” for the war. At the end of the last war, the American ruling class insisted, as it had to do if it was to be consistent, that the Japanese should adopt a constitution which renounced totally and for ever any armed forces. But, of course, the realities of capitalism soon caught up with America. Within a few years the American capitalists saw that their next enemy would probably be Russia, and that Japan was almost certain to be America’s ally in that war. So, against strong Japanese opposition, the Americans themselves insisted on Japan renouncing its American-sponsored constitution, and setting up again a strong army, navy and air force.

Endanger the alliance

This, of course, is now history. But exactly the same thing is currently happening with those other “incurable militarists,” the Germans. The German capitalist class has made immense profits since the war, helped by the fact that they have not had to pay very much out on armaments. The German rulers feared attack only from Russia; such an attack, they thought, was almost impossible because the United States would immediately counter-attack with atom-bombs. But the American capitalists have been getting increasingly unhappy about having to shoulder the burden of Germany’s arms-spending as well as their own. Germany already has 350,000 men under arms, and has been persuaded to try to raise this figure to 500,000; but now the Americans are urging Germany to increase the Bundeswehr to a strength of 700,000. This suggestion, however, is very unpopular in German official circles. The German ruling class would much rather go on keeping its large profits and letting the Americans find most of the money for the arms build-up against Russia. In particular, they are relying on the American H-bombs in any future war. In a recent television broadcast, Herr Strauss, the west German Defence Minister, criticized the idea that Western Europe could rely on conventional weapons alone, and said that the theory that the United States would use its nuclear weapons only if American territory were attacked was false. But what he said next showed that he really meant he hoped it was false: “If this were the official view in Washington,” he said, “it would endanger the (Nato) alliance.”

So the present position is that the German ruling class is doing its best to avoid having to build up its armed forces, while America is doing its best to persuade it to do just that. It all seems a very long way from the propaganda we had thrust down our throats in the last war.

Alwyn Edgar

50 Years Ago: Patriotism and Scarlet Coats (1961)

The 50 Years Ago column from the January 1961 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our ruling class can see that their Continental rivals are determined to obtain as large a share of the markets of the world as possible, and that sooner or later this must culminate in world-wide disruption. Hence their anxiety on the score of “patriotism.” Lord Esher gives expression to his anxious thoughts in the suggestion that “patriotism” is an attribute of the empty-headed. “How can you expect,” he writes, “recruits for your Territorial Force, when you dress them unbecomingly?” One paper, commenting on his noble Lordship’s article, suggests “a scarlet coat and a towering headdress” as the most effective appeal to the “patriotism” of the working class, though whether on the old, tried and trusty ground that those who have least in their heads must make the greatest show on them, or on the later calculation that now the workers are discovering how little country they have to fight for they may be induced to fight for their togs if only they are sufficiently removed from the humdrum drab of the corduroy to enable them to forget that they are countryless workers, does not transpire.

[From “The Decline of Patriotism” by J. R. R., Socialist Standard, January 1911.]

Corporal punishment (1984)

From the November 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

Most inner-city High Streets have an army-recruiting office where the raw are taken in (literally) to find themselves in plush surroundings; where the harvesting recruitment sergeant patronises the newly-germinated with smarmy small-talk about ski-ing and discos on far-off shores, using all the underhand skills and techniques of a sales representative for Cannon Fodder Incorporated. The process of recruitment from the High Street Office to the training camp can be as little as two weeks. During this period there is hardly enough time for the recruits to read the large-print in the glossy magazines, let alone the small-print surrounding their twenty-two-year contracts.

At the High Street Office the unsuspecting windfalls are tested in Arithmetic. English and Physical fitness, after which there is an interview. The Arithmetic and English are to ascertain the recruit's degree of simplicity. The medical decides whether the next in line can walk or hold a gun. The interview is perhaps more sinister. This is when the would-be soldiers are asked — prior to taking the Oath of Allegiance — if they are Communists. Have they ever been a Communist? Do they know any Communists? Answering "No" to these questions. they receive their one-way tickets to the training camp. Recruits are then trained like animals in a circus, with tit-bits for the good dog and a crack of the ringmaster’s whip (the Regimental Sergeant Major's pace stick) for those who don’t sit up and beg.

To obtain discipline and control the Army has more subtle methods than boot bulling and potato peeling. They have a long history of expertise in military psychology on which they can draw. The tools they use for processing the recruits are Conformity, Alienation and Competition.

Conformity

To impose Conformity the recruits must first be robbed of their individuality. This is done by inflicting uniformity of looks and behaviour on all soldiers. Uniformity of personal appearance is achieved at the first stop in camp, the barber's shop. The haircut and the clean-shaven look strips many young people of a part of their identity. If they were a little green in joining the Army in the first place, they become greener with a visit to the Quarter-Master's stores where they are issued with about six suits of varying sizes, just as many hats and the obligatory identity tag. informing them of their new name: an eight-figure number. Loaded with more new clothes than they have ever had at any one time, they set off to their accommodation having almost forgotten their frightening new hairstyle.

Impressed by the self-confidence of the reception Corporal, the new recruits are under the misapprehension that all they need to do is put on one of their new suits and they will be transformed into the new macho man. The dormitories each house twelve to twenty and are furnished in the most basic fashion — one bed, one locker and one chair for each person, laid out in a military style which is about as welcoming as a nuclear winter. With so little furniture you could think it easy to keep clean. The recruits soon discover that this isn't the case. For the forthcoming weeks they are cleaning the floor and removing dust from 5am to breakfast and then later from 5pm until lights out. with short breaks in between to clean their kit. Complete uniformity of behaviour is hammered into those with any remaining personality of their own during square bashing. Here marching, saluting and rifle drills are choreographed to such a degree that Lionel Blair would be envious.

Alienation

Alienation is another wrench in the mechanism of the military machine, used to twist the squaddies away from social interaction and to tighten the nut of docile acquiescence. Few of the trainees have much experience in letter-writing and many of their families cannot afford a telephone. so it isn't too long before they become isolated. This separation from family and friends, coupled with the confinement to barracks that most training camps impose. make it impossible to make new friends in the local community. The new soldier becomes so lonely and introverted, bullied helplessly into shape. For the smallest mistake the recruits are humiliated, bawled at and in some cases physically beaten.

A recent case of bullying was that of a new boy, or “sprogg" who, after a kangaroo court in the barrack room, was found "guilty” of not polishing his floor space to the required standard and was sentenced to be hung. He was beaten up by a dozen others, stood on a chair, blindfolded and a noose was tied around his neck. After a lengthy pause in which he broke down pleading for mercy, the chair was kicked from under his feet. Fortunately for him the rope was not secured to the rafters above.

Black balling is common among recruits. and many of the dangers they face in training are from each other, as each tries playing at soldiers with little more than an Action Man comic to go on, plus the stories learned from dad down the pub the night before they left. The recruits show a willingness to participate in any community pursuit and try to to impress anyone and everyone with their mixed-up league of priorities. They will take part in the humiliation of others, pleased that it is not happening to them. They have the childish notion of one who does not know right from wrong; if everyone else does something then it must be right. The alienating process has them so frightened that when they do join in group pursuits they often show their insecurity with violent reaction. 

Competition

Competition is the third bracket that straps the cogs to the tank tracks. Recruits are told from the outset that they must shape up to perform with team spirit in an endless cycle of competition that ends up like a game of snakes and snakes. Those who fail to perform well enough at individual and team skills are made to go back in training (back squadded). Competition strains at every level of the Army. At Battalion level there are about 600 men divided into four Companies, each of which has four Platoons of 30-40 soldiers. They are divided further into four sections of 8-12 and competition is intense for promotion and the cushy life. The sections are at loggerheads to be the best section in the platoon. The platoon is rife with the obsession to be top in the Company and the Company, predictably, is all-out for the coveted Battalion premiership. Of course the Battalion has its role to play at Garrison level and every Garrison goes all-out to be the best in the Army. The question is. where you go with the best Army in the world? Afghanistan? Grenada? or the Falklands?

Armies compete on behalf of the nation-states they represent for strategic positions on the trade map, areas rich in mineral resources and trade routes. In the name of defence they are often sent by governments to embark on expansionist imperialism. The sporting competitions of football and rugby, much advertised in the glossy brochures that could well have been composed by Saatchi and Saatchi, fall by the wayside when the Army enters the big league of politics at its sickening best. With such an extensive conditioning attack it is little wonder that the trainees soon appear to be the unthinking patriotic morons that the drill sergeants, non-commissioned officers and officers have set out to make them. The Army has disrupted everything that was important to the ex-civilian and imposed a new set of values. It is by treating the recruits in this way that governing them becomes easy and so effective.

The Queen's Regulations (the bible of the British Army) make interesting reading. For example, under Section 69(a) of the Army Act 1955 are listed offences against their god — good order and discipline — under which it is possible to charge someone with anything, including breathing. It is not uncommon for soldiers to be charged with “dumb insolence” when there is no better excuse than the face not fitting. Soldiers are caught by the jankers under these Acts. 'Frying to quote from the Queen’s Regulations in their defence can lead to another charge of insolence.

The ranks above are continually reminding the soldiers that they are not paid to think, with the old cliche:

Yours is not to reason why;

Yours is but to do or die.

This is shortly followed by a reprimand for not using their initiative. In recognising that the soldiers go through a very severe conditioning process we ask ourselves a few questions: Does it work in every case? Are there any long-term effects? and Is this conditioning a barrier to socialism? The answer to the first question must be that the conditioning of the soldier does work in most cases, proof of which can be found at the graves of Verdun or the Somme or Arnheim and the countless millions of nameless graves across the world where worker has killed worker for countries in which they had no stake. There are a few trainees who get out of the Army in the first few weeks but the majority feel compelled to stay, under the misbelief that it would be cowardice to leave. Secondly, are there any long-term effects? The sad answer is yes. We are familiar with the war wounded who were never hit by the enemy’s bullets, but were struck by a life in billets and camp songs for whom the last war has never ended. Many workers, however, have learned that no workers' interests are at stake when the capitalists make battle. Thirdly, what about the conditioning process? This is not a barrier to our achieving a socialist society. We have seen American soldiers conscripted to fight in Vietnam desert to the safety of Sweden. We have recently seen a film of the Russian soldiers defecting in Afghanistan and must conclude that as the individuals mature, so do the ideas and vice versa.

Jimmy Bob

Military indoctrination for schoolkids (2025)

From the July 2025 issue of the Socialist Standard

A recent headline grabbed our attention: ‘Military gap years for teens and school lessons on defence to prepare UK for war’ (i paper, 2 June)

Amidst the war hysteria being ramped up by the governments of the UK, Germany and France, and by Brussels, our schoolchildren too are not being spared the fear-mongering.

‘Teaching’ them ‘defence’ and ‘respect’ for the killing forces of the capitalist state is not an education in any sense, but an indoctrination in fear and an unpardonable assault on young, impressionable minds. Whilst capitalism exists war is an ever-present reality which can only be removed when capitalism itself is abolished.

As for ‘teaching defence’, it is a repugnant falsehood to make people believe there is any defence to be had in the event of a nuclear war. The weapons defend nobody. They inflict mutual annihilation. There can be no life following such an exchange, let alone any desire to still be alive.

If the word obscenity was ever to be really defined, it is by the present British government’s imposition of war panic on the populace and on our children. Not to mention the psychologically and emotionally vulnerable. The taking away of livelihoods and the continual squeezing of the poorest in society is not, it seems, enough for the Starmerite government.

Every year, capitalism shows us just how low and how anti-life it can sink. It is this defunct and lethal system that needs to be abolished now before it abolishes life on our planet. Only the working class themselves, the vast majority, can and must abolish capitalism – the system of death.

A.W.

50 Years Ago: Conscription (1962)

The 50 Years Ago column from the December 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

The question as to whether or not conscription will, in the near future, become a necessity, appears to be once again very much “in the air." Lord Roberts, in the course of a recent speech, during which he implied the failure, and foreshadowed the disintegration, of the Territorial force, advocated more strenuously than ever his pet notion of universal military service. In this advocacy he is, of course, acting quite logically —more logically, indeed, than those “lovers of peace” (chiefly to be found among the Liberals and Labourists) who, while upholding and using all their efforts to maintain the present capitalist social system, at the same time deprecate what is, in reality, quite in accordance, morally and politically, with the development of capitalism.

*

To a man such as Lord Roberts, who has managed to make a fortune and win a title through professional soldiering, military service will, of course, seem all that is desirable. But what the devil is the poor drudge of capitalism, the wage slave, to get out of it? A fortune and a title? Hardly! At what should be the best portion of his life — his early manhood — he would be taken, numbered like a convict or a beast of burden at a cattle show, herded with his fellow beasts in compounds, trained and drilled and bullied and brow-beaten, taught to walk upright and to handle a rifle, taught to shoot sufficiently straight to kill and maim certain of his fellows (whom he has never seen before and with whom he has no quarrel), coming out of the Army at the end of his term with all the virtues of an efficient, non-thinking, non-questioning wage-slave, with all the initiative and all the self-confidence knocked out of him. Truly a delightful prospect!

[From the Socialist Standard, December 1912.]

The Fruits of Anarchy. (1915)

From the November 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

Curious effects of divergent interests.

When a period of trade activity has been unusually protracted, the inevitable crisis invariably startles the economists of the ruling class in the midst of ruminations on their good fortune, or genius, in having at last overcome trade epidemics. As with the trade crisis, so with war comes as a bolt from the blue, shattering theories, exposing contradictions, dissipating hopes, and falsifying prophecies.

Anarchy in Interests Produces—

Conflicting interests must always produce conflicting ideas. A survey of prevailing ideas will consequently give some notion of the underlying anarchy of capitalist interests and conditions.

One group of idealists we can afford to leave to their own shallow cogitations. Those who argue that without war to develop and ennoble—and kill off the fittest—the human race is certain to degenerate. They are backed up by the “war traders” for obvious reasons. Opposed to them are the humanitarians, the anti-militarists, and the peace-loving bourgeois traders, whose ships, heavily insured, are on every sea. These traders, always fearing for their markets, express vehemently their belief in arbitration and their suspicions of diplomatists generally. In the interest of trade Andrew Carnegie subscribes two millions to finance a peace tribunal. At the same time armament firms subsidise the Press and frighten the ignorant with scares, bribe high-placed officials through their agents in all parts of the world, cater for every nation or province that happens to lie inflicted with agitators, whose business it is to keep alive feuds and magnify every action of a neighbouring-State into a sinister threat against the cherished freedom of the people.

Anarchy in Ideas.

The following quotation from the “Daily News and Leader” (15.7.14) presents quite typically the attitude taken up (in peace times) by the peace-mongers :

“If there is not soon a world-wide movement against the tyranny of war and of all the infamies associated with it, it will not be for lack of lessons. Wherever we turn, to France or Russia, Germany or Japan, Italy or our own country, the evidence accumulates of the burden which the war-traders put upon the backs of the people. Their business has no relation to patriotism. It is cosmopolitan in its operations and soulless in its motive. It works upon the fears and hates of ignorant people, uses the Press as the instrument of its purposes and makes tools of the diplomatists and the statesmen, many of whom are financially interested in its success. In Russia, in France, and now in Japan we have seen how it can buy up the very services and make lackeys of the generals and admirals of army and navy. Its maleficient influence overshadows the democracy of every land and until we have found a way of uprooting the whole evil system there will be no real progress made towards peace or an enduring civilisation.”

“Our own country” is not excepted in this sweeping statement. The Prime Minister, when confronted with figures relating to the operations of armament firms abroad, said he dared say the figures were correct, but he knew of no sufficient reason for instituting an enquiry. Shortly after two of the largest British firms entered into a contract with the Turkish Government to carry out extensive works at Constantinople that meant the virtual re-modelling of the Turkish navy, while just before the outbreak of the war, according to a prominent war correspondent, “the British Admiralty was lending missions of naval officers to Greece and Turkey, to hasten in co-operation with the contracting syndicates the preparation of their war forces.” The same writer added : “There is not a feud, or the possibility of a feud, but these tradesmen are at hand to egg on the rival adventurers, and to ‘equip’ them with the latest instruments of the science and art of wholesale homicide.”

Circumstances, you know, Alter Cases.

The peace-mongers forget their former denunciations when their country is involved in war. The “business” of the war traders has a close “relation to patriotism” when the “latest instruments of the science and art of wholesale homicide” must be placed in the hands of the workers to defend capitalist interest. The cry is then “Pile up the munitions ; more elbow room to the war traders.” They forget what they have said—but they cannot unsay it.

Before the war it had become almost a platitude that great wars of conquest, religious wars, etc., were things of the past ; that to-day commerce and industry dictated the policies of the different nations. Since the war every capitalist hack has been busy denying the economic cause—even while crying : “Capture the enemy’s trade”—repeating again and again that the struggle is between “militarism and democracy.”

“Prussian militarism” has become an everyday phrase. Exactly what is meant by it has never yet been clearly explained. According to some supporters of the so-called voluntary system, it is synonymous with conscription ; others affect to see difference between the French and German forms. One fact beyond dispute is that the capitalist class of every country maintain armed forces up to the strength they deem necessary to cope with their enemies within and without ; and it is even more certain that the capitalists of no country hesitate to use them when their interests are at stake. The methods may be slightly different, but the object is always the same—to retain possession or ownership of the means of life.

Relatives are Best Apart.

For instance, the Kaiser, according to Benjamin Kidd (in the “Daily News and Leader,” 7.9.15), appeals directly to his conscripts, saying :

“In view of the present Socialist agitation, it may come to pass that I shall command you to shoot down your own relatives, your brothers, your sons, or parents, which God forbid, but even this you must obey without a murmur.”

while Mr. Asquith, in the House of Commons says, in answer to a question (I quote the “Daily Chronicle.” 24.3.14).

“I think it is a very good rule, where the military force is called in to render assistance to the civil power, in exceptional cases, both as regards officers and men, so far as you can do it, to avoid the employment of those who are locally connected by personal, domestic, or social ties.”

In peace time every increase in armaments raises the war discussion anew and furnishes fresh evidence in the shape of contradictions, confessions, and absurdities. Ten days before the declaration of war the United Methodist Conference passed a resolution “protesting against the ominous growth of armaments.” One rev. delegate declared that

“the war spirit was not in the heart of King George, the Kaiser, the House of Commons, the Reichstag, or in the hearts of the British or German people. It was in the brain of a few irresponsible journalists, who were obsessed with a dastardly kind of Imperialism. He hated strikes, but would be glad to see a strike of the great democratic forces of Europe as a protest against this wicked, inhuman, and sinful waste of money.”

Note how these despicable followers of the mythical Christ are concerned for their masters’ money—a fraction of which comes to them in the shape of livings. One would almost imagine it was of greater importance in their estimation than human life did one not remember that personal ambition overshadows everything else in the mind of the up-to-date Gospel hawker.

Notoriety being their goal, it does not always follow that popular ideas must be applauded ; sometimes the reverse will bring a freak Non-conformist within the circle of the lime-light. At present it is almost criminal to denounce war, even in theory yet the president of the Churchmen’s Union at Rugby goes even further and denounces scientists for their share in it—possibly on principle, because he recognises the antagonism between science and religion. He

“deplored the employment of the latest discoveries of science and the newest inventions of civilisation not in the service of mankind, but to kill, burn, and torture. Men of science and learning had been bribed by the rulers of nations to prostitute their powers to the invention of horrible instruments for the wholesale killing, poisoning, and torture of brave men.”

Parson’s Filthy Job.

Obviously this is a case of the pot reflecting on the sooty condition of the kettle. The priest is equally susceptible to capitalist bribery with the scientist, and just as ready to furbish old superstitions or manustitions or manufacture new ones, to the detriment of the working class, as the scientist is to invent or improve instruments for the perpetration of wholesale murder.

So much for the irresponsibles. There are writers and politicians, however, that are considered authoritative ; but we shall be disappointed if we expect to find their utterances free from similar contradictions and absurdities. Mr. Norman Angell in “The Great Illusion,” we are told by a contemporary,

“Lays down the principle, which he enforces by references to recent history, that in the case of a great war the victor suffers more in the long run than the vanquished. . . . Moreover, because also of this interdependence of our credit-built finance, the confiscation by an invader of private property . . . would so react upon the finance of the invader’s country as to make the damage to the invader resulting from the confiscation exceed in value the property confiscated. So that Germany’s success in conquest would be a demonstration of the complete economic futility of conquest. . . . For allied reasons, in our day, the exaction of tribute from a conquered people has become an economic impossibility.”

In November 1910 Mr. Asquith, speaking on the subject of international relations, furnished the occasion for a Press discussion in which prominent leader writers expressed similar views to those of Mr. Angell. The “Aberdeen Evening Gazette” (11.11.10) said :

“If Germany beat us, she could not destroy our trade : she could not seize any of our colonies or annex any of our territories. She could not exact a ‘thousand million’ indemnity, because credit is now an international business, and to impair British credit would be to shake her own. If Germany smashed us she would smash her own best customer, and her own people would pay the penalty.”

The ”Times” (11.11.10) said:

“They move, as he says, in a vicious circle. They arm because they distrust one another, and they dis-trust one another because they are armed. It is a chronic malady, the cure of which Mr. Asquith is optimist enough to hope for through the growth of a more genial spirit among the nations. A more potent agency will perhaps be the increasing complexity of international relations, which makes it difficult for one nation to damage another without almost equally damaging itself.”

The “Westminster Gazette” (11.11.10) said :

“Trade is a great pacificator, and the international credit on which trade rests is a thing to which war is abhorrent. The fear of breaking the peace and the difficulty of breaking it grows with the growth of armaments. And at the same time the subconscious conviction that the whole collective process is a kind of insanity must gradually project itself into the conscious proceedings of civilised nations.”

These quotations are by no means isolated. In recent years similar opinions have been repeated so often that they should be familiar to every newspaper reader. But note the change since the outbreak of war. Every possible evil, from economic, annihilation to wholesale slaughter, has been flung at the heads of the workers to frighten thorn into the recruiting office or the munition factory. When the international capitalist class saw no immediate cause for quarrelling, their scribes told us our trade could not be destroyed by Germany, nor could our colonies or territory be annexed. A war indemnity could not be exacted by Germany because it would shake her own credit. Yet Britain’s credit is to be shaken by this very action, according to every responsible newspaper, while the self-appointed “Adviser-in-Chief to the British Nation”—Mr. Horatio Bottomley—says that “we shall need an army of occupation to mind the German capital whilst the war indemnity is being paid.”

Many writers have uttered grave warnings on the horrors of war, and have suggested remedies that were almost laughable—if the subject were not so tragic. Mr. Egmont Hake, in the “Daily Telegraph” of September 6, 1892, prophesied that

“We shall have battles raging for days over extensive grounds, hurried and disorderly retreats, desperate pursuits, and consequently, miles of country strewn with carcases and corpses. Should we wonder if to this tragedy Nemesis were to add her epilogue —pest.”

and the remedy is, “a liberal support of our hospitals” !

Professor Gardiner says :

“It should not be impossible to build upon the basis of the international comity of savants a society of men pledged to use their powers and discoveries not for destruction, but for saving life, not for promoting, but for moderating friction between nations.”

Benjamin Kidd told us in “Social Evolution” that the Christian religion was responsible for an ever-growing altruism and humanitarianism in the “Western civilisations.” He is, perhaps, surprised at the calmness with which these peoples regard the slaughter going on to-day, though, he admits his theory is falsified and that altruism is useless as a force to avert war, when he suggests that the Allies should “declare the United States of. Europe”—and, one might add, arm in preparation for war with the United States of America, or some other combination of powers in competition with them for the world’s markets.

But about the most outrageous thing that has been said on the war question is the reply given to those workers who asked what is their stake in the country. “Their wages.” Those wages that for “millions of the workers do not suffice to replace the energy used up in their daily toil.” The wages system is the most complete and tyrannical form of slavery evolved during centuries of class domination. Wage slavery squeezes every ounce of energy out of the workers and scraps them, condemns men, women, and children to degrading poverty and continual anxiety and, as “John Bull” says, “the sordid atmosphere of the office and the workshop.”

This is the worker’s stake in every land—if he seeks diligently and has the luck to find a master. But if he has knowledge concerning the position he will detest the wages system, and if he has wisdom in addition to knowledge he will work for its abolition and the establishment of Socialism. The nationality of his master in the meantime will not count with him : all members of the master class alike are to him parasites that live by his labour and drive him into the factory with the whip of unemployment and hunger, to be exploited.

F. Foan

A Look Round. (1907)

From the February 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Street Betting Act was a great victory for Reform, according to the Daily News, which suppresses starting prices but not Stock Exchange quotations.

* * *

The first result has been to intensify the unemployed problem. Men who had been living by “making a book,” acting as touts, etc., have taken to legitimate business, and workmen have been discharged to make room for them. Reynold’s Newspaper says that prominent police officials openly express the opinion that rigid administration of the Act will have a distinct tendency to increase breaches of the law in other directions as an enormous number of persons have been suddenly compelled to find some new means of livelihood.

* * *

What are they going to do ? The Daily News knows that it is impossible for every one to get permanent employment to-day, that a large section of the community must prey upon the others. And if by Acts of Parliament or acts of God certain of them are suddenly deprived of their usual means of livelihood, they must seek a living elsewhere.

* * *

Perhaps the Daily News will permit “L.G.C.M.” to explain how these bookmakers, touts, runners, watchers, and all others connected with street betting can get an honest living in view of the indisputable fact that so many already find it impossible to do so.

* * *

If all drunkards became teetotallers, all pickpockets and burglars reformed, all corner-boys turned over a new leaf, all tramps became enthusiastic for “honest” toil, what a happy land England would be ! Would it, my Christian friends ? Think what it would mean if all these folk entered the labour market and competed for “honest work,” a labour market already so overstocked that many of the largest and strongest Trade Unions find their resources taxed to the uttermost, owing to the heavy and increasing demands upon their Unemployment Funds.

* * *

The Rev. C. F. Aked, who has been “called” from the Pembroke Baptist Chapel, Liverpool, to J. D. Rockefeller’s Fifth Avenue Church, New York, says that he has received hundreds of begging letters and wonders whether people take him for a fool. If it be true that he is giving up £l,500 for £5,000 a year, his wonderment seems somewhat unnecessary.

* * *

Rockefeller did not take him for a fool, but for a tool. The Trust Magnates can foresee the approaching struggle between the “have-nots” and the millionaire holders of aggregated capital. They will endeavour to delay it by every possible means. In this they will be assisted by “advanced” clergymen, who will accept, the slaveholders’ dollars to preach patience and peace to the wage slaves.

* * *

The first number of the Voice of Labour says that “the Labour movement, organised, federated, largely international, holds in its hands, even more than it deems, the forces that, shall fashion the future . . . That is why the politician, Socialist, Labour, and Liberal, promises so much to gain its votes.” This is on page 1. On page 7 it says “When the people find that, the Socialists and Anarchists are not what the Press depicts ” &c.

* * *

We note that “the Editor is not necessarily in agreement with, nor does he hold himself responsible for, signed articles,” and the article on page 7 is signed. According to it the Socialists are not what the Press (i.e, the Voice of Labour) depicts.

* * *

We freely admit that there are some calling themselves Socialists who have promised and do promise all sorts of impossible “reforms” to gain working-class votes. We have charged them with misleading the working class and adding to working-class confusion, and we have given evidence in proof of our charges. But we claim that these people have no right to call themselves Socialists, and we have always held that the workers will not be emancipated until they emancipate themselves. Surely our friends of the Voice of Labour know whether they are Socialists or Anarchists ?

* * *

The Conservative Press are doing their utmost to convey the impression that Progressivism and Socialism are one. They are as wide asunder as the Poles. But there is certainly some justification for this in view of the municipal this and municipal that which members of the Labour Party, S.D.F., I.L.P., and Fabian Society devote their time to advocating. And now, according to Justice, we have Councillor J. Jones (S.D.F.), opposing Mr. B. Sansome in a debate on “That the Progressive and Socialist Policy on Municipal affairs is harmful to the Community and especially to the Working Class.”

* * *

Councillor John Jones opposes the proposition that the Progressive Municipal Policy is harmful to the working class. Why then, does the S.D.F. declare itself in opposition to Progressives, and appeal for funds to enable it to put forward candidates when its candidatures may result in Progressive seats going to the Municipal Reformers and an alternative policy to that of the Progressives and Socialists being pursued ?

* * *

Mr. Will Thorne, M.P., has been interviewed for the Trades and Labour Gazette. “I cannot tell you,” he says, “when I became a Socialist.” Neither can we. “In trade unionism I am known as a Socialist “; he adds, “my municipal work has been done with Socialist ideals before me ; and when I entered the House of Commons it was as a Labour man and a Socialist.” (note which is first). “My constituents sent me there as such. My fellow members know me as a Socialist, at least I think they do. In a short time I hope so to manage things that there will be no doubt about it.” !

* * *

And so, although he became attached to the S.D.F. in 1884, and is still a member, he has a doubt whether his fellow M.P.’s know him as a Socialist ! But it will, he hopes, be all right in a short time, when he manages things differently.

* * *

Mr. Winston Churchill has written, “My dear Bell,” meaning Richard of that ilk, Labour Leader and Liberal M.P. for Derby, defending the action of the Liberal Government in prohibiting the Servants of the Central South African Railways from taking an active part in political agitation. He thinks it right that “prominent political activities should be denied to them, so long as they continue, as Government Servants, to draw Government pay,” and approves of the circular issued by Lord Elgin. The Daily Chronicle considers that Lord Elgin “has acted very properly.”

* * *

What a howl of execration went up from Liberals when it was suggested that certain Tory employers here had endeavoured to deny “prominent political rights” to their employees. But now that the Liberals are in office their dictum is that government employment must carry with it political disabilities. And Mr. Bell, as a good Liberal, will continue to support his Party, even tho’ they prove their readiness, when opportunity offers, to do that which the ordinary capitalist does not attempt to do, viz., control their wage slaves out of working hours.

* * *

In the Journeymen Bakers’ Magazine appears a portrait and interview with Mr. Alexander Wilkie, M.P., General Secretary, Associated Shipwrights’ Society. Asked what books had exercised the greatest influence on his life, he replied, “the Bible and the poetry of Robert Burns.” “When all is said and done” he added, “I fall back upon the Bible and Burns, and I am of opinion that a man cannot build his life upon a more stable foundation.”

* * *

At the December meeting of the London Trades Council a resolution was moved protesting against the sentence passed upon Stoker Moody, and Mr. Quelch moved to add the words “and demands the abolition of courts-martial in times of peace.” He did this, he said, with a view to civilising the Services and breaking the rule of caste. From which it would appear that he believes in courts-martial but only in times of capitalist war, not when the capitalist class are pleased to be at peace with each other and are not ordering the working class to risk their lives in the interests of their masters. And does Mr. Quelch really think that the capitalists will abolish courts-martial because he may persuade the L.T.C. to pass a resolution “demanding” it ?

* * *

Later, Mr. Quelch moved : “That this Council condemns the encouragement of ‘jingoism’ given by the surreptitious introduction of rifle practice into our elementary schools as part of the ordinary curriculum, and calls for the abolition of the standing army as being dangerous, unnecessary, and unconstitutional; this Council being further of opinion that all the military requirements of the nation would be met by the adequate training of all citizens in early manhood to the use of arms, thus constituting the whole manhood of the nation a citizen force for the national defence, and free from the burden and charges of the present military organisation.”

* * *

The italics are ours. What is the nation, and what is national defence ? The nation to-day is the propertied class, in whose interests wars are carried on. Preparing for the national defence means preparing to defend the property and interests of the propertied class of Great Britain against the interests of the propertied class of another country. Should Socialists encourage the working class to believe that they have national interests that must be defended ?

* * *

Mr. Quelch claimed that he was the first to use the phrase in this country the “armed nation.” He said that Mr. Haldane hoped to get his “armed nation” on the voluntary system. But the voluntary system had broken down. He was opposed to teaching children the use of firearms, in the way in which it was being introduced, because he believed it was intended to encourage a love of militarism and to bolster up the voluntary system. What they wanted was universal training—every man drilled and armed as a soldier, but remaining a citizen, as in Switzerland. . . . This was not conscription … it was the antidote to conscription, to militarism, and to jingoism, and so on.

* * *

From which a very clear idea of Mr. Quelch’s position can be obtained. He would civilise the Services, i.e., offer greater inducements to the working class to become “food for powder” in the interests of the capitalist class and their property ; he objects to the surreptitious introduction of rifle practice into elementary schools—he would do it openly and above board, then it would not encourage jingoism ; he is opposed to voluntary effort, and would make it compulsory for every citizen to be drilled and trained in the use of arms ; this compulsion is not conscription, certainly not, “only ignorant or untruthful persons so describe it” ; he would foster the idea of nationalism, and would have the working class compelled, by their masters, to make adequate preparation to defend the national (capitalists’) interests against those of some other national capitalists.

* * *

I could understand Mr. Quelch advocating that as a workman becomes class-conscious he should take steps to prepare for the defence of the international working class against the international capitalist class, that he should not pin his faith to one method of attacking and ultimately vanquishing his exploiters, but it is beyond my comprehension how a professing Socialist can advocate a narrow and working-class dividing nationalism. In opposition to his attitude we say : “Workers of all countries unite ; you have nothing to lose but your chains—you have the the world to gain.”

J. Kay

Cannon fodder needed (2024)

From the May 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

In The Big Engine, by sci-fi writer Fritz Leiber, the protagonist posits his theory that people were ‘just machines, set to do a certain job and then quietly rust away.’

So no surprise to find a capitalist-supporting politician appealing to the hang ‘em, flog ‘em brigade who begrudges ‘their’ taxes keeping the ‘work-shy’ in supposed idle luxury whilst they themselves resent their wage slavery drudgery.

‘Young jobseekers who repeatedly turn down work should be conscripted for two years’, a Tory MP has said. Richard Drax, a member of the Commons Defence Select Committee, said there is a growing issue with work-shy youngsters: ‘In some cases, particularly among some of the young, they have got to a point where, for whatever reason, they’re not prepared to contribute to our country and to serve their country. If they can’t be encouraged to do that, then maybe we’ve got to a point where they should be told to do so.’

What would, once upon a time, be surprising is that Labour Party politicians, (not even making a pretence at being a working-class party any more), is as evangelistic in its support for the capitalist system and for capitalists.

Not only does capitalism need bodies, to produce and to be exploited, but it also needs cannon fodder.

The ‘war machines’ are becoming more vociferous and more insistent. Many more establishment voices, here and abroad, are ingraining the idea of a forthcoming war – probably with Russia and the necessity to protect the Motherland, ie, capitalist interests, either through voluntary swelling of the military or through compulsion. Understandable if, as an exploited class, you ask, in the manner of the The People’s Front of Judea, what’s the motherland ever done for us?

Richard Drax lays it out plainly – ‘And if they’ve refused three offers of a job, or whatever the number would be, and they say ‘I’m sorry, I’m not doing any of that’, you then say – in which case you must go and do two years in the Armed Forces’ (Daily Express 12 March).

Sir Alex Younger, an ex-head of MI6: ‘Britons have been “infantilised” since the end of the Cold War and the Government should consider having the power to “compel” people to serve’ (MailOnline 5 April).

General Sir Patrick Sanders, the outgoing Chief of the General Staff opined that ‘British citizens should be ‘trained and equipped’ to fight in a potential war with Russia – as Moscow plans on ‘defeating our system and way of life.’ It’s not known if he was pointing his finger Lord Kitchener style when warning that ‘increasing army numbers in preparation for a potential conflict would need to be a ‘whole-of-nation undertaking’.’

SkyNews said the comments are being read as a warning that British men and women should be ready for a call-up to the armed forces if NATO goes to war with Russia. It comes after Defence Secretary Grant Shapps said in a speech earlier that we are ‘moving from a post-war to pre-war world’ and the UK must ensure its ‘entire defence ecosystem is ready’ to defend its homeland.’

The Estonians, no friends of Russia given their history, are also adding fuel to the conflagration. The Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said in a BBC interview: ‘We have a reserve army of 44,000 people. That would equal for Great Britain around two million people. Two million people who would be ready to defend their country, who know what they have to do’ (Daily Express 4 April).

In Ukraine at the beginning of the year, the former Commander-in-Chief of Ukraine’s army Valerii Zaluzhnyi said that the army needed another 500,000 soldiers: ‘Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a law that will lower the country’s minimum conscription age from 27 to 25, potentially boosting the number of men available to fight Russia’s invasion. A statement published by Parliament upon passing the law in 2023 said it was “inappropriate” that “a significant number of citizens” who were fit for military service could not be called up, despite the present need, under martial law. Martial law also prohibits most men between the ages 18 and 60 from leaving Ukraine, unless they are deemed unfit for military service for health reasons or have an exemption’ (CNN 2 April).

Sensibly following the example of many American young men who, during the Vietnam war, chose to absent themselves from America, many Ukrainians have adopted ‘flight not fight’: ‘Approximately 650,000 Ukrainian men aged 18-60 have left Ukraine for Europe since the start of Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022′, BBC Ukraine reported. Citing data provided by Eurostat a report notes over half a million male refugees are currently residing in the 27 EU member states, as well as Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and Norway, many of whom are undocumented. In Germany, it is estimated that 100,000 unregistered individuals are residing in the country, while in Austria at least 14,000 Ukrainian men arrived using forged documents or the services of smugglers.

Under martial law, Ukrainian men between the ages of 18–60, with some exceptions, are not allowed to leave the country because they could be called up for military service. As Ukraine faces the challenge of maintaining adequate military personnel, recent reports indicate that nearly 20,000 Ukrainian men have managed to evade conscription, finding various routes to leave the country’ (Kyiv Independent).

John Richards’s song, Don’t Despise The Deserter, about a soldier who is executed by his country, has historical precedents. Three hundred and six British and Commonwealth soldiers were executed by the state in World War One.

‘So I ran from the fighting, and I threw down my gun,

I ran by the moon, and I slept with the sun.

Arrested by government, charged by the king,

To be shot, ’cause I can’t kill in order to bring

Peace to a foreign land.’

Less about peace and more about capitalism.

Don’t let yourself be persuaded to become cannon fodder for the capitalist class.

Dave Coggan

Voice From The Back: Coal, steel and blood (2002)

The Voice From The Back Column from the February 2002 issue of the Socialist Standard

Coal, steel and blood

For generations apologists for capitalism have churned out the lie that modern war is caused by different ideologies. We have been told that the First World War was a war against militarism and the Second was a war for democracy against fascism. The socialist view is that war is the logical outcome of economic rivalry and now one of the pillars of capitalism confirms our view, inadvertently while he discourses on another subject. As Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, the Italian economist who is now a major influence at the European Central Bank, has written: “It can hardly be denied that establishing joint supra-national management of coal and steel – the two fundamental natural resources of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, over which France, Germany and the rest of Europe fought cruel wars was a highly political project.” Observer (9 December).

The cause of poverty

For almost a hundred years the Labour Party have argued that poverty can be abolished inside capitalism. Socialists have always argued that capitalism with its class divisions and production for profit is the cause of poverty. The latest figures on Labour’s failure to deal with poverty inside capitalism illustrate our point. “More families are classified as very poor now than under the last full year of Conservative government, according to new research. The number of people living in households with less than 40 per cent of the average income in 1999-2000 was 8.3 million, 100,000 more than in 1996-97, a study published today by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation says.” Times (10 December).

Terror thugs and terrorist teachers

Under the heading “Terror thugs groom future suicide killers” The New York Post (11 December) reported that kids between 4 and 8 years of age were being taught how to be suicidal terrorists by the Palestine terrorist group Hamas. What they didn’t report is that the US government are also guilty of “robbing kids of their childhood”. “On another front, the Pentagon has succeeded in establishing its first Military Institute, as a public middle school in Oakland, CA. The school’s 1,200 cadets, whose average age is twelve, wear uniforms, perform military drills, and are instructed by military approved teachers.” (WWW.CITIZEN-SOLDIER.ORG).

Who needs the brain scan?

One of Labour’s election boasts was that it would improve the NHS, but what is the reality? “A medical scanner costing millions of pounds is being used to treat pets at an NHS hospital which does not have enough nurses to treat its patients . . . News of the animal treatment scheme comes as the Bedford Hospital Trust has warned it will have to close an operating theatre to avoid a £3 million deficit by the end of the financial year.” Observer (23 December). It is good news for well-heeled pet owners though. A London divorce lawyer was delighted that her 13-year-old poodle had a brain scan and prompt medical treatment at the hospital. This must be a great consolation to workers waiting for treatment on Labour’s new, “improved” NHS.

Inappropriate tears

After the horrendous events at the Twin Towers the outgoing Mayor of New York Rudolph Giuliani talked about the site being devoted to a memorial to those killed. The new mayor Mike Bloomberg would now like to distance himself from such foolish, unelectable sentiments. “Mr Bloomberg all but ruled out using the whole site for a memorial. He said that the value of the 16 acre property and the demands of the area for jobs and businesses meant that it would be inappropriate to devote the whole of the space to a single monument.” Times (5 January). Sympathy, condolences and sentiment are all very well, but inside capitalism profit is the driving force, so let us not have inappropriate tears. Although as human beings, they are the only ones we’ve got. Nearly 3,000 human beings died that morning. We still cry, inappropriately, of course, at the madness of capitalism.

Scandal? What scandal?

Under the headline “Scandal of NHS beds auction” (Observer, 6 January) reported that more than 10,000 private patients were treated last year in the UK’s NHS hospitals. That these patients jumped the queue for treatment and cited the case of NHS patients having to wait six months to a year for a heart by-pass operation while for a fee of £15,000 “they can be operated on almost immediately by a surgeon of their choice”. So where is the scandal? Inside capitalism if you are poor you can be homeless, if you are rich you can live in a beautiful house. If poor you will probably get a sub-standard education, if rich you can get the best that money can buy. That is the way capitalism operates – if you can afford it you can buy the best medical treatment, if not get to the back of the queue.

This is progress?

All the slaughter, maiming and terror of the recent Afghanistan conflict was justified according to the Western press by the wonderful improvements in human rights in that country. A report in the Brussels newspaper (Le Soir, 19 December) would seem to indicate that this is far from the truth. “Public executions, stonings and amputations are going to continue in Afghanistan in accordance with the Sharia law, a top Afghan magistrate has stated, while promising more fairness and clemency than during the time of the Taliban. “For example, the Taliban used to hang the bodies of victims in public for four days”, the judge Ullah Zarif explained, “we will only expose them for a short time, say 15 minutes”. As for those guilty of adultery, they will certainly be stoned ‘but we will use smaller stones’, judge Zarif said.”

Tiny Tips (2024)

The Tiny Tips column from the January 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

A bottle of Scotch whisky billed as ‘the most sought-after’ in the world sold Saturday for almost 2.2 million pounds ($2.7 million), an auction record for a bottle of wine or spirits.

[Link.]

We often assume that religious beliefs are no different in kind from ordinary factual beliefs—that believing in the existence of God or of supernatural entities that hear our prayers is akin to believing that May comes before June. Neil Van Leeuwen shows that, in fact, these two forms of belief are strikingly different. Our brains do not process religious beliefs like they do beliefs concerning mundane reality; instead, empirical findings show that religious beliefs function like the imaginings that guide make-believe play.

[Link.]

Margot Friedländer, the 102-year-old Holocaust survivor, recently offered a few important words during an appearance on one of Germany’s most-watched political talk shows. ‘There is no Christian blood, no Muslim blood, no Jewish blood,’ she said. ‘”It is all human blood. We are all equal.’ And further: ‘I believe there is something good in every person. Take the good and forget the bad. It’s so easy to be human.’ Perhaps Greta Thunberg should have a sit-down with Friedländer. It might be a good start for getting back on the right track.

[Link.]

‘Queers for Palestine’ attempts to meld LGBT advocacy with Palestinian liberation, a juxtaposition that has precipitated a whirlwind of criticism and ridicule, since LGBT rights scarcely exist within the Muslim world; and the Palestinian territories are no exception. The slogan has been widely satirized. Variations like ‘Chickens for KFC’ and ‘Blacks for the KKK’” highlight its proponents’ basic lack of awareness of just how incompatible the values of the Western left are with those of the Islamic right they so readily champion.

[Link.]

They Survived Hell – but for Some, They’re Only a Means of Production

We were shocked to discover that mere days after being rescued, the migrant workers were pressured to return to work, including through threats to withhold their passports and their salaries. In some cases, they were required to return to work in the Gaza Envelope – near the killing fields they had just escaped.

[Link.]

The Pacific Institute, which regularly updates its Water Conflict Chronology, reported that at least 228 water conflicts were recorded in 2022—an 87 percent increase over 2021—driven in large part by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russian forces attacked water pipelines and supply systems in a number of Ukrainian cities after invading in February 2022, targeting water resources a total of 56 times since the war began .

[Link.]

A majority of American adults (72 percent) would not be willing to serve in the military were the U.S. to enter a major war, polling from Echelon Insights found, while public confidence in the armed forces also appears to be waning. It comes as all branches of the armed forces have struggled to meet their recruitment targets. Since 1987, the number of active-duty personnel has fallen by 39 percent.

[Link.]