Cooking the Books: Clutching at green shoots (2009)

The Cooking the Books column from the July 2009 issue of the Socialist Standard

The textbooks may say that the banking system can create loans worth ten times more than an initial deposit in any bank in the system, and currency cranks may misrepresent this to mean that an individual bank can create money to lend out of thin air, but practising bankers and financial journalists know better.

A recent article in the Investors Chronicle (22-28 May), discussing the difference between banks in Asia and banks in Britain and America, gave the views of an investment manager, Mike Kerley:

  “‘Consider the banks in the US and the UK,’ says Mr Kerley. ‘They lend out far more than their deposit base and rely on credit markets to fund this, which has been shown to be ill-advised, costly and ultimately catastrophic.’ Although the Australian market is closely aligned with the UK banking model, elsewhere in Asia the deposit base more than covers lending, so there are no serious liquidity issues. ‘Banks are the opportunity in Asia. Asian loans to deposit ratios are 80 per cent,’ he says. ‘Asian banks do what banks should do and make money on margins’.”

This is a typical confirmation that banks make their core profit out of  borrowing money at one rate of interest and re-lending it at another, higher rate. No bank can lend money it doesn’t have so they have to get this from somewhere. In the past all banks used to get the money to re-lend, as banks in Asia still do, from what had been deposited with them. In recent years, however, banks in Britain and America, started to borrow money to re-lend from the money market.

Banks in Britain and America still make their profits (or suffer losses) out of the margin between the rate of interest at which they borrow and the rate at which they lend. The difference is their reliance more on borrowing money from the money market than from depositors (a deposit is essentially a loan to a bank). The money market is a much more volatile source of funds than deposits, as American and British banks eventually found to their cost.

When the crisis began interest rates on the money market went up, so squeezing the margin between the two rates of interest, in some cases wiping it out or even making it negative. Hence the banking crisis. Things seem to have settled down a bit at the moment.

Not that the banking crisis was going to last for ever. Nor will the economic crisis. However, before a recovery can begin stocks must first be cleared, though this won’t be enough in itself. There are signs that this may have started, but is being optimistically seen by some economic commentators as a sign that the depression is over. “Recession is over, says think-tank as it reports growth in April and May”, headlined the Times (11 June) reporting the opinion of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research.

The Times’s own Business Editor, David Wighton, was more cautious:

“If the upturn we are seeing now is in large part because of restocking, there will be a spike in orders which will inevitably fall back again”.

There is still some way to go before economic conditions will be ripe for a recovery to really begin. Unprofitable firms must be eliminated, their capital destroyed or devalued, and real wages must fall, so as to restore the rate of profit. That means more company failures and more unemployment. In short, more misery in a world that could provide plenty for all if it weren‘t for capitalism.

50 Years Ago: Race and Violence (2009)

The 50 Years Ago column from the July 2009 issue of the Socialist Standard 

Race & Violence

With the recent murder of a coloured man in Notting Hill, race-prejudice has once more become a subject of public interest.   It is not possible to say at this stage whether or not Kelso Cochrane died as a result of racial hatred.

What can be said is that passions, hatred and sympathies have been aroused. A large crowd of mourners, both white and black, followed Cochrane’s coffin through the streets. Many organisations have had their say about Notting Hill; some of them, such as the Union Movement, propagating racial discrimination. There is no doubt that the Union Movement is anti-coloured, and rabidly so. It considers that this country should be reserved for Englishmen. This is a “one way only” policy however. Not so many years ago a main plank in Mosley’s platform was the intensive economic development of British Africa; for the benefit of the British, of course. “Keep out the coloureds” does not mean keeping the Pinks out of South Africa, Kenya or Nyasaland. The left-wing too, have been having their little stir. They, poor souls, are in a bit of a quandary, for the Labour Government’s record does not look particularly attractive. The imprisonment of Nkrumah and the banishment of Seretse Khama must make the collection of coloured people’s votes a rather difficult matter. There are, too, plenty of advocates in the Labour Party for the policy of restricting or excluding immigrants. The supporters of such views, to be logical, should exclude or restrict the movement of anybody going anywhere to look for jobs.

(From front page article by F.R. Ivimey, Socialist Standard, July 1959)

Greasy Pole: Hogg’s ditch (2009)

The Greasy Pole column from the July 2009 issue of the Socialist Standard

What with all the talk about reforming Parliament, antagonising MPs by restricting their ravenous appetite for expenses, it may not be long for the famous green benches to be swept clean of those venerable persons wallowing in titles like the Right Honourable Douglas Hogg, Old Etonian, Third Viscount Hailsham, Privy Councillor, Barrister at Law, Queen’s Counsel, Member of Parliament (for the present) for Sleaford and North Hykeham, brother of a High Court Judge, husband of a baroness and owner of Kettlethorpe Hall, a stately home in Lincolnshire. With a moat – about the only exterior relic of the original 13th  Century  house. It is some time now since Hogg was at his most active politically; he was Minister of Agriculture Fisheries and Food from July 1995 until Labour’s victory in 1997 since when he has stayed contentedly inconspicuous.

Whistle Blower

But that was before the Daily Telegraph, digging into the secrets of the MP’s claims as revealed by that whistle blower’s expensive aids to research, turned the spotlight away from the drab fiddlers on the Labour benches and onto the gloating Conservative manipulators opposite. This made sickeningly fascinating reading, for among the claims for money for a chandelier and a swimming pool was one for clearing the moat at Hogg’s home. The new Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy marked the occasion at a Manchester school: “What did he do with the trust of your vote?/Hired a flunky to flush out the moat”. A nation-wide rush to consult architectural reference books revealed that a moat is water surrounding somewhere – a castle, a fortified house – important enough to need such a defence against an invading  enemy or perhaps, in some cases, irate deprived Lincolnshire peasantry. A moat is expected to be, in scale with the place it defends, impressively large – wide and deep (Alan Clark, the late alcoholic and disreputable MP who owned the magnificent Saltwood Castle in Kent, was in the habit of taking a swim in the moat there) with a drawbridge to filter out unwanted visitors. The photographs of Hogg’s moat, however, showed it to be not much more than an above average sized ditch – although one which obviously needs regular, expensive cleaning paid for through parliamentary allowances. David Cameron was infuriated at the revival of the stereotypical image of the greedy Tory toff which he has worked so hard to eradicate.

Lord Chancellor 

As a lawyer Hogg is accustomed to defending the indefensible and his response to the Daily Telegraph’s exposure was desperately evasive: “That is not correct. It was in a letter which explained what expenses we had incurred, it wasn’t an expenses schedule…All the claims I made were agreed in advance”. Reinforcing this attempt to pass the blame for his behaviour elsewhere he conceded, when asked about his constituents’ anger at his claim for the moat, “It is true that the system is clearly flawed”. Hogg’s ancestors would have been proud of his lawyerly skills here; although he has remained a humble QC both his father and grandfather rose to the heights of Lord Chancellor, head of the country’s judges and in the House of Lords sitting, by ancient custom, on a large cushion called the Woolsack from where the noble lords were kept under control, speaking to the point and avoiding all challenge to the presumptions of property society. However humble, Hogg is a rich man, with shareholdings and property investments which protect him from the kind of penury familiar to some of his infuriated constituents.

BSE And CJD

Unlike his eminent forefathers Hogg did not make a name for himself in government. At his peak, in charge of Agriculture Fisheries and Food he was marked down as The Minister Without A Friend. Rivals on the lower reaches of the Greasy Pole happily fed the media with snide gossip about him, typically that he had been given the job when the first choice had turned it down because it was politically suicidal. When the BSE crisis broke in 1996 and the first cases of the human variant CJD were reported Hogg was cruelly exposed as lacking the sleight of word so essential to survival. Alan Clark, who could always be relied on to kick someone when they are down, recorded meeting “little Douglas Hogg” in 1983,when he was a Junior Whip: “I can’t decide whether he is likeable or not. (But I should say that many do not have this difficulty.) I don’t mind people being rude, provided that they are not uncouth with it. But he is colossally self-satisfied. Or is it a chip?…’Well,’ I said ‘how are you keeping all the new boys in  order?’…’By offering them your job’.

Sacked

Well very soon someone will be offered Hogg’s job. “I have decided” he said on 18 May “that now is the time to tell the Sleaford and North Hykeham Association that I will not be standing at the next election”. It was a polite way of saying that he had been sacked for failing to fit in with Cameron’s efforts to recast the Tory image into a youthful, classless, open party who can, by a process so far unattainable to all others, transform capitalism into a humane society. But euphemisms are essential to a  politician’s vocabulary; over the expenses scandal they have been extensively used to muddy the reality that while the amounts of money involved in the Lord’s and the MP’s wretched scams are mind-boggling to so many workers struggling to survive they are trivial compared to the cost, in every sense, of the damage capitalism does to the world and its people.  

Ivan

The Strutting Turkey and the Dancing Bear (1939)

From the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

The international situation is changing with the rapidity of a cinema film, and those who aspire to the role of prophet are likely to make many mistakes; one fact we can state, however, and that is events have taken full control; even a Hitler or a Churchill no longer does what he would, but what he must.

In the hectic days of the First International it was considered a duty on the part of Socialists to lay bare the mysteries of international politics so that the real motives that animated statesmen could be perceived and, if necessary, thwarted by the class-conscious proletariat. Alas for the progress made in this connection; the present generation has little more knowledge of the forces at work than its predecessors : the son falls for the same slogans and catch-phrases that fooled his father.

Some of our masters talk peace, but those in charge resolutely pursue the war, the war to end Hitlerism.

After the war of 1914 there was a dispute as to who was to blame for it. Germany, under Hitler, made a vigorous protest against that country being saddled with the war guilt. This time Chamberlain has moved his chessmen in such a way that there is apparently no doubt about the matter. Hitler is caught. Britain is, as usual, fighting a righteous battle. The whole world is called upon to witness the fact. If it is discovered in the days to come that Britain’s moral feelings are, as of old, in strict accord with her material interests, well, what would you have? We live in a material world; all nations and peoples are in the clutch of circumstance. Britain and Germany confront each other because the development of capitalism has placed groups of capitalists in rival camps; the only way out is war. It is impossible for the exploiters to reconcile their differences; the antagonism between them must become ever more intense.

Those who talk so eloquently about Peace with a capital P do not seem to grasp the fact that the obstacles to peace are greater than those obstructing war. Capitalism is based on competition. The means of production are owned exclusively by a section of the community; those that are dispossessed must sell themselves to the owning section in order to live.

The owning class give those who sell their life-force to them sufficient to keep going as producers of commodities which become the property of the owning class as they are brought into being.

Commodities are articles produced for sale, for profit. The latter cannot be realised until the commodities are sold.

To sell you must find a buyer. The only portion the worker can buy is that equivalent to the wages he receives; all over and above this amount must be disposed of elsewhere.

Markets are found abroad which temporarily relieve the situation, but as the productivity of labour increases, and more and more countries are brought within the orbit of capitalism, the difficulty to sell is intensified.

The world is scoured for raw materials by rival gangs; the wage slaves are driven faster and ever faster, so that relative cheapness can enable one exploiter to undersell another, but all in vain.

The markets are decreasing comparatively and the powers of production are increasing. The capitalist class must sell in order to realise profits and yet they are compelled to set in motion factors that make the necessary sale ever more difficult.

The unemployed grow in number in all lands and eventually the situation becomes so bad that the harder pressed gangs of exploiters become desperate, arm their slaves, and demand at the point of the sword certain concessions in the way of a right to raw materials, markets, etc., from their rivals—the war is on.

The battle-cries of Democracy and Dictatorship should not blind us to the real issue, nor should the plausible piffle of the “only Socialist country in the world” fool us in such a way that we fail to perceive the enemy in ambush. Russia stands for capitalism, Russian capitalism, distinguished from other brands by the fact that it is, if anything, more treacherous, more hypocritical, and more ruthless than that of any other country.

The bear that walks like a man is now interfering with the life of other peoples without ceremony or apology. Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, Roumania and the Balkan countries have all been made to feel that now that Britain’s hands are tied they are in duty bound to minister to the bear’s requirements. Russia has, at the same time, moved swiftly in Chinese Turkestan, and from the proximity of Kasgar now threatens British interests. Sinkiang, or Chinese Turkestan, will soon come into the picture and may be the scene of conflict. Not far from this area is to be found valuable mineral wealth. When I say not far, I mean the approach to the locality is from this region. Near the source of a tributary of the Yangtse River there is a district containing all the mineral wealth necessary to the establishment of an industrial country—iron, coal, silver, gold, etc., all in close proximity to one another. This will cause trouble in the not far distant future. Russia will grab it if she can, and others will try to prevent her getting it. Britain knows and is fully prepared for what is coming.

The Near East has not yet become the scene of large-scale operations, but recent movements round Palestine, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, right to the Afghanistan border, show to the observant mind what is pending.

Turkey occupies a very important position at the present time and although she may be compelled to apparently acquiesce to certain demands made upon her by Germany or Russia, there is one country she will always be faithful to, and that is Poland; she will stand, if possible, with Poland and her friends.

This is one of the mysteries of international politics. During the 150 years that Poland was dismembered Turkey always reserved a chair for the Polish Ambassador, and when Poland emerged again as a nation after the last war the Polish representative went to Turkey and took his place as if nothing had happened. The geographical position of Turkey in the present conflict enables her to wield an influence far greater than is generally supposed. Turkey is making rapid strides as a capitalist nation, and will not fail to make full use of her opportunities. Russia’s action in Poland will not be favourably viewed by Turkey and may have important repercussions.

The forces in the Mediterranean are regrouping. Mussolini is extending the hand of friendship to Hungary and Hitler’s influence is being curtailed. Italy and Britain have never fought: they probably never will.

The readers of the Socialist Standard may say, “Very interesting, but where does Socialism come in?”

We will sum up by drawing the attention of the reader to the fact that the Russians, through their Foreign Office, the Communist Party tried to get Britain, France, Italy and Germany involved in Spain, then in Czecho-Slovakia. They wanted Fascism smashed by any means necessary. “Leave off talking about Socialism; we must get rid of Fascism first. Down with Hitler.”

They formed Popular Fronts, etc., to work things up.

What was behind it all? Can’t you see?

Russia wanted her rivals to be involved in difficulties, so that they could not stop her grabbing what she wanted.

Look at the Communist Party now, and look at Russia. The Nazis are their comrades. Their anti-Fascist propaganda was a make-believe and a sham—to fool you. What a mix-up there will be should they shortly quarrel. “Thus bad begins and worse remains behind.”

We are on the eve of great developments in the United States. Passions there will be at fever heat shortly. The President will have a rough period to go through.

Where do the wage-slaves get off at ?

It is to be noted that the Government here has taken charge of the economic life of every individual in the community. The State has taken over.

We may never go back to the old state of things entirely. This is not Socialism. Far from it. But it makes Socialism easier to obtain; it enables us to get into the heads of our fellow-workers a clearer idea of what we are endeavouring to get him to do.

Amidst the waving of flags and the beating of the war drums let our battle-cry be “the common ownership of the means of life,” reiterated again until it penetrates into the consciousness of the class to which we belong.

When the aftermath of the struggle comes upon the world, when the dead are counted and buried and our wounded brothers surround us on every hand, when amidst grinding anguish, made bitter by poverty, the disillusioned wage slave cries “What shall we do?”

We can give the ringing answer, “Dare to be a man! Shake the chains of wage slavery from your limbs. Make the means of life common property. Stand erect, free!”

Charles Lestor

Notes by the Way: The Communist Yes—No—Yes Policy on Colonial Peoples (1939)

The Notes by the Way Column from the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Communist Yes—No—Yes Policy on Colonial Peoples

The following pronouncements by Communists need no comment. Made at different dates, they reflect the Communist double-somersault on war.

Mr. T. A. Jackson, Communist writer and speaker, in 1937 : —

 “I have neither love nor liking for that evil thing—the British Empire. But rather than see a single African, Asiatic, American or Polynesian pass under the control of Fascism (whither Hitlerite, Mussolinite, or of any other brand), I would fight in the same way, and urge others to fight to preserve the British Empire. . . .—(Plebs, February, 1937.)

* * *

Communist Party Central Committee, September 2nd, 1939.

The Manifesto which the Central Committee issued on September 2nd, 1939, giving reasons why they supported the war, contained, as one of the Communist war aims : —

“Extension of full democratic rights to the Colonial peoples.”

* * *

Mr. Harry Pollitt, in “How to Win the War” (September 16th, 1939).

  “When Abyssinia was attacked by Italian Fascism some people in Britain said it was not our business to do anything about it; Abyssinia was an autocratic and feudal state, and it made no difference to the Abyssinian people whether they were ruled by their own monarch or by the Italian imperialists. The Communist Party did not accept this standpoint.”

* * *

The Daily Worker, October 7th, 1939 (after the Communists had stopped supporting the war) : —

  “And now Hitler repeats his demand for colonies. Shall British workers fight to decide whether the colonial people are to be oppressed by the imperialists of London or of Berlin ? The only fight we will wage is for the freedom of the colonies from all imperialistic masters, for democracy in the colonies, and the right of self-determination.”

War-Time Powers of the Government

The following Editorial was published by the Sunday Express (October 22nd, 1939): —

“Under Section 18B of the Order in Council amending the Defence Regulations, a Secretary of State can make an order—

(a) Prohibiting or restricting the possession or use by any person of any specified articles;

(b) Imposing on any individual such restrictions as may be specified in respect of his employment or business, in respect of his association or communication with other persons, and in respect of his activities in relation to the dissemination of news or the propagation of opinions;

(c) Directing that he be detained.

“So long as such an order is active against any individual he may—according to the regulations—be detained in such a place and under such conditions as the Secretary of State may determine and shall while so detained be deemed to be in legal custody.

“Such an order obviously destroys at the will of a Secretary of State the Habeas Corpus Act, which is the basis of the liberty and freedom of the citizen.

“In past wars there have been restrictions on liberty, but nothing so sweeping and so potentially dangerous as this.

“M.P.s ought to demand some limitation of these powers before it is too late. They might also ask whether any persons have already been detained in such circumstances—and why.”

* * *

The Times, October 27th, 1939, published further details :—

 "Another regulation deals with the causing of disaffection, and provides that no person shall “endeavour to cause disaffection among any persons engaged (whether in the United Kingdom or elsewhere) in his Majesty’s service.” A regulation on the subject of “propaganda” begins by laying it down that no person shall “endeavour, whether orally or otherwise, to influence public opinion (whether in the United Kingdom or elsewhere) in a manner likely to be prejudicial to the defence of the realm or the efficient prosecution of the war.” The expression “public opinion” is denned as “including the opinion of any section of the public.”

This regulation also includes the following sections: —

(2) The Secretary of State may make provision by order for preventing or restricting the publication in the United Kingdom of matters as to which he is satisfied that the publication, or, as the case may be, the unrestricted publication, thereof would or might be prejudicial to the defence of the realm or the efficient prosecution of war . . . .

Yes, But Which Attitude ?

From the Daily Worker (October 16th. 1939):-

“The Communist Party’s attitude towards the war is attracting a flow of new members to the Party.”

The Strange Case of “Professor Mamlock”

“Professor Mamlock” is a powerful anti-Nazi film produced in Russia, and shown to 30 million Russians since it was made in 1937. It was banned by the British Censor before the war, but in the first week of the war the Censor reversed his decision and it is now being shown in London.

In the meantime, Russia had signed her Pact with Nazi Germany, and according to the Daily Herald (October 7th, 1939) the film has now been banned in Russia !

The Man Who Did Not Know There Was a War On

The newspapers have been satirical about the German prisoners taken by the French, who said they did not know they were at war. They were told by the German authorities that they were on manoeuvres, and the explosions they heard were blasting and target practice. A strange but true story.

We know another equally strange. We know of millions of workers who have been suffering from capitalism all their lives, and yet, so powerful are the uses of advertisement, they are convinced that capitalism does not exist, and that poverty is an act of nature.

Suppose There is a Military Revolt Against Hitler, What Then ?

Mr. Duff Cooper, former First Lord of the Admiralty, recently gave an interview in New York in which he predicted that Hitler’s dealings with Russia would finally produce a revolution in Germany (Daily Telegraph, October 23rd, 1939). According to the Telegraph’s correspondent, he said that “it was likely that the revolution, although originating in the army, would produce a new monarchy rather than a military dictatorship.”

All of which looks very much like re-creating in Germany a military-bureaucratic Government like the Kaiser’s Government, against which the war of 1914 was said to be waged.

Children, We Have Need of You

  “Germany is returning to the employment of child labour on farms, according to an agricultural expert, speaking on the German radio.

  “On my own farm,” he said, “I employ children whose average age is 12.”—(Daily Telegraph, October 30th, 1939.)

* * *

  “The Isle of Ely Education Committee have decided that, owing to the serious scarcity of labour, they will raise no objection to boys and girls of 12 years of age and over being absent from elementary schools in the Isle of Ely at any time from September 27th to November 17th, to assist in agricultural work. “—(Times, September 28th, 1939.)

Truth, The First Casualty in War

From an article on Nurse Cavell, in the Evening Standard (October 10th, 1939): — 

“Her terrible inability to tell a lie.”

Edgar Hardcastle

Interest in Finland (1939)

From the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

An Englishman who is watching the Finnish crisis with close interest is Lord Melchett. As a director of Mond-Nickel, Lord Melchett has valuable interests in Finland. The company own one of the country’s principal industries–the nickel mines in the north, which have only been working for two years, but which, outside Canada, are among the most important in the world.

Together with Finland’s unexploited mineral resources they provide some food for temptation to covetous neighbours.–(Evening Standard, October 27th, 1939.) 

The Prospect for Socialism – What Will Happen After the War? (1939)

From the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

The outbreak of the second Great War prompts the question: What are the prospects for Socialism when the war comes to an end? While the last war was dragging on, Socialists, as may be seen from the columns of the Socialist Standard at the time, took an optimistic view. Seeing the gigantic senseless slaughter and knowing that the capitalist promises of a brave new world would never be fulfilled, Socialists held that the workers of all countries in vastly increased numbers would soon be brought to see the impossibility of any reconstruction, except on the basis of Socialism. It was too optimistic a view, as events proved.

Though disillusioned with pre-war Liberalism and Toryism, Kaiserism and Czarism, the workers found new illusions to keep them from the path to Socialism. Labourism, Bolshevism and Fascism occupied the void left by the collapse of the old parties and institutions. Must we, then, argue from this that optimism now is equally mistaken? Must we take the view that all is as it was and no progress has been made? That would indeed be a shattering blow to the Socialist movement and the principles on which it is based. Without self-deception it can be answered that the working class have made very real advances in understanding since 1914, and a moderate optimism now has a firm foundation.

No Enthusiasm for War

What are the grounds for optimism? One that first compels notice is the small amount of enthusiasm for the glories of war. Except perhaps among the young, there is now none of the intoxicated eagerness for battle and conquest that was in evidence in the warring countries in 1914. For years we have witnessed the Governments – particularly of the Dictator States, and not excluding Russia – using all the devices at their disposal to inculcate in the minds of the population an unthinking readiness for war and sacrifice, and a worship of the martial glories. Children of 10 years, and even younger, were being drilled and regimented and trained in the use of arms and taught that war was the supreme vocation of man. Yet the outbreak of this war has shown that the populations of all countries, without exception, prefer peace to war. The people of Italy, who were supposed to have been turned by the Fascists into a solid block thirsting for war and conquest, heaved a great sigh of relief that they were to remain out of the war at least for a time. All newspaper correspondents, in all countries, have agreed that the great mass of the men and women of Europe do not share the bellicose sentiments of the Hitlers and Mussolinis, and their counterparts in the democracies. In short, the great mass propaganda has been a colossal failure, and that fact is of importance, even though, with the progress of the war, it may later on be submerged as the tide of passion is inflamed by the slaughter of loved ones.

All Socialists Now

The other great change compared with 1914 is that the workers are seeking something better and different from the things they sought then, and are noticeably less easily fobbed off with promises merely to carry on capitalism on the old lines Dr. Goebbels, in one of his closer approximations to the truth, has said of the Germans that they are now a “politically-minded nation.” It is an exaggeration, perhaps, but the workers in all countries are, in the mass, more interested in fundamental political and social questions than they were 25 years ago, less attached to capitalist theories and more ready to give ear to anything which can even appear to be Socialistic. All those whose real purpose is to maintain the fundamentals of capitalism have had to take note of this change of working-class outlook. If hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue, “National Socialism” and kindred new disguises under which capitalism masquerades, is the tribute capitalism pays to Socialism. The workers will no longer vote, work or fight contentedly for capitalism, naked and unashamed, so the capitalist apologist must needs clothe his aims in Socialist phraseology. Hence the vague references in the speeches of British politicians to the need for building a new world after the war, and the plausible Labour Party argument that democracy must be safeguarded by winning the war in order that Socialism may in due course be achieved. Hence the Communist and Russian propaganda in defence of the Russian-German Pact, which represents it as a “victory for Peace and Socialism.” Hence the Nazi propaganda broadcast .over the wireless to the French workers which “attempts to convert the French listener with talks about social reforms in Germany and the necessity of ‘true Socialism’.” (Times, October 21st, 1939.) Hence the move by Hitler’s Government to allow Nazi speakers in Germany to promise radical reforms on the Bolshevik model, and the “suppression” of capitalism (Evening Standard, October 20th, 1939).

Only the very simple will conclude from this that Europe’s rulers have suffered a change of heart and become converts to Socialism. They are adapting themselves to the workers’ growing disillusionment with capitalism and hope in Socialism. They did not seek this change, but they could not prevent it. They have delayed it and are now using all their ingenuity and that of the tools and dupes to delay it still and side-track it into ends harmful or useless to the workers. They will fail, and the war they have now engaged in will hasten the eventual complete enlightenment of the working class. Robbed of the progress we expected after the last Great War, the Socialist movement can count on reaping a full harvest when peace comes again, no matter what course the war may take.

Edgar Hardcastle

Moscow Turns a New Somersault and Mr. Pollitt Holds the Baby (1939)

From the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is many years since a prominent English Communist fell a victim to the acrobatic changes in Communist Party policy. Some years ago J. T. Murphy walked the plank and fell. He resigned, but his resignation was refused on the grounds that working-class parties do not accept resignations. His deviation was duly and gravely considered by the Executive Committee of the Communist Party and he was expelled.

And now Mr. Pollitt has fallen from grace. True he has not been expelled, nor has he resigned. In this connection the Daily Worker (October 12th, 1936) puts the matter very nicely: “There is no truth in the suggestion that Harry Pollitt has resigned from the Communist Party. In view of the differences of opinion which were expressed during the discussion (on the question of continuing the war), the Central Committee decided that Harry Pollitt should not continue as General Secretary, but should undertake other duties for the Party.” Despite a weak attempt to obscure the facts, Mr. Pollitt is obviously a casualty of the polite English equivalent of the Russian purge. Mr. Pollitt’s name was associated more publicly with the recent peace-front and anti-Nazi line than any other Communist. Without warning Moscow decided on a change of policy. To put some sort of face on the change, Mr. Pollitt has been liquidated. A short while ago the first hint of a change in Russian foreign policy came when Litvinoff was removed from his position of Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the Russian Government. The uninitiated may be puzzled by the procedure. It is, nevertheless, a way they have where the dictatorship ideology prevails. Unlike countries where democratic institutions exist, the machinery of dictatorial government provides few means of escape from situations like this.

For many years Mr. Pollitt has been the most outstanding and popular personality in the Communist Party, loyal to every change in policy. He was the loudspeaker which faithfully relayed Moscow. No matter how much the line changed Mr. Pollitt could always put over those changes with sufficient adroitness to make black appear white, and white appear black. Though, of course, constant changes in policy could not fail to promote skill in this direction. And what changes there were! One week the “line” was, support the Labour Party, the next, oppose it. One day the “line” was to treat the Labour Party like well-meaning, but mistaken, brothers in a common cause, and the next to refer to the erstwhile brethren as “traitors,” “Social-Fascists,” “renegades,” “capitalist hacks,” etc., and etc. Had the Vicar of Bray known our modern professional Communists he surely would have acquired rapid promotion to the Archbishopric of Canterbury! And yet even the Communist Party has met a situation which now taxes its ingenuity in finding plausible explanations to satisfy its followers. And this time it is no ordinary somersault. Previous changes in policy have been relatively harmless. have had no worse effect than to provide entertainment for the sophisticated. But the present is the somersault of somersaults. It is supreme in its cynicism, trickery and double-dealing. Communist Party supporters have been as severely shaken as the self-righteous equanimity of the official elements.

The policy of the Communist Party in this country and elsewhere has always been subject to the dictates of Moscow. Of recent years it has been along lines which the present ruling clique in Russia considered to be in conformity with Russia’s trading interests. The desertion by Russia of the traditional policy of isolation and the joining of the League of Nations placed the Communist Party in the position of having to turn its back on about fifteen years of anti-capitalist and anti-League propaganda. It was embarrassing, but not beyond their resourcefulness. The results have now come home to roost. Russia’s need and desire for position and prestige in the international trading and political world were the mainsprings that pressed her on. The necessities of the game soon found her supporting one Power or group of Powers as against another Power or group. And the Communist Party soon found that it not only had to support the League of Nations, but what it really stood for: the political dominance in Europe of the Powers that dominated the League, Great Britain and France. And so the Communist Party, which never practises half-measures, were soon the loudest in demanding the logical application of League principles. Hence its demand for military sanctions against Italy and the closing of the Suez Canal during the Abyssinian War. When the influence of the League waned they came out openly in support of an alliance between the “peace-loving” Powers against the “aggressors.” In domestic politics this resulted in the demand for the popular front, which became a plank in Communist Party programmes, even as far afield as the United States. The Popular Front was to include “progressives” of all parties, that is, all those who agreed with the Communist Party and their methods of “standing up to the aggressors.” They roundly abused Chamberlain for even negotiating with the untouchable Hitler. The effect on Communist Party propaganda was not without its amusing side. The hammer and sickle and the slogan, “Workers of the World, Unite,” disappeared from the front page of the Daily Worker. The customary violent and flamboyant abuse vanished and the “traitors” became “statesmen.” Tories, duchesses, bishops, and Communists appeared together at public meetings in support of the new policy, and cooed at each other like old maids at a christening party.

And now it has all ended, suddenly and without warning. Even the wily political variety artists at Communist headquarters have been caught napping. The Russian Government changed its mind and deserted the Allied group of capitalist Powers in favour of Germany. The Nazi and Soviet gentlemen have arranged a truce in the war of loathing and abuse which they have hurled at each other for years, and ingenuous Communists have now had the pleasure of gazing in rapture at the Press pictures of Stalin and Ribbentrop smiling sweetly into each other’s eyes. Whereas the old policy expressed itself in demands for self-determination for small nations, e.g., Czecho-Slovakia, Spain, Austria, and so on, the new one has to approve the agreement to carve up Poland and to square the “self-determination” propaganda with Russia’s efforts to acquire dominance over small nations like Latvia, Estonia and Finland, an effort which she pursued with the familiar Nazi technique of placing an army on the borders of those countries. Military force, the last word in capitalist argument, will decide the issue when Russia seeks to “protect” little nations, not conferences which will discuss democratically the “rights” of “self-determination.”

But does the Communist Party eat its words? Does it come before the workers in humble repentance for the criminal hoax which it has perpetrated upon them in the name of Marx and revolutionary traditions? Do they—do they hell! In the words of many a humble stumper of earlier and more honest days, when less of the bourgeois accent was heard from the Communist platform—not bloody likely! The Communist Party has subtler methods. Witness a statement issued by the Central Committee which appeared in the Daily Worker (October 12th). It says: —

 

The manifesto of October 7th corrects the declaration issued on September 2nd. The present war is not a just war, but an unjust and imperialist war. . . .

A few strokes of the pen and the tearing, raging, democratic (pro-British, pro-French), anti-Nazi (German) propaganda has been wiped out. Only the Catholic Church could equal this easy wiping away of past sins. Note that the “Manifesto of October 7th corrects the declaration of September 2nd.” A three years orgy of high-pressure propaganda in all branches of Communist activity is a little error, made on September 2nd, and corrected on October 7th. Could chicanery go further? Just a little. Read on: “In view of the differences of opinion . . . the Central Committee decided that Harry should not continue as General Secretary.”

Get the implication? It was Harry Pollitt’s error which stood to be corrected. It was Pollitt who wrote the pamphlet, “How to Win the War,” which has proved awkward for Moscow and the Communists. In it Pollitt wrote: —

  “The Communist Party supports the war, believing it to be a just war, which should be supported by the whole working class and all friends of democracy. . . . To stand aside from this conflict, to contribute only revolutionary-sounding phrases while the Fascist beasts ride roughshod over Europe, would be a betrayal of everything our forbears have fought to achieve in the course of long years of struggle with capitalism.

  The British workers are in this war to defeat Hitler, for a German victory would mean that Fascism would be imposed on the defeated countries. If there is one thing that is certain, it is this, that the British working class detests Fascism, as it does those who in Britain have helped to strengthen it, and is determined to do everything in its power to bring about the defeat of Fascism and that of its supporters in Britain. Therefore it will do everything it can to bring the war to a speedy conclusion, but only by the defeat and destruction of Hitler and the Nazi rule from which the German people have been suffering for six years.”

But Pollitt wrote what every Communist journalist has been writing and working up to for years, what every paid and unpaid speaker has been expounding. He wrote what was strictly in accordance with the policy dictated by the Russian Government and in line with their interests. Now he has slipped—in short, he has been left holding the baby. Could anything more expose the whole make-believe of leadership and dictatorship?

But the Communist Party now says that the war is an imperialist war, and cries for peace. Shall we, then, be soft in our judgment and give praise? Pause, friend, and think. The Communist Party has had no change of heart; it has merely obeyed the College of Cardinals at Moscow. In doing so it has been true to its traditions and its paymasters. And when Moscow calls again it will obey. And if later it appears to be in line with Russia’s interests to make a deal with the “democracies,” then the Communist Party will experience another change of heart. The “just war” which became an “unjust war” by the simple process of the Daily Worker issuing a decree on October 7th, will again become a “just war.” The suppression of objective truth, the sycophantic flattery of representatives of the capitalists will re-appear. Watch carefully the peaceful Communist Party. The honest pacifist commands our respect. The purely professional, time-serving politician, our contempt.

But—it is an ill wind that blows no good. The case that we have stuck to for twenty years has again been justified by events. At the time of the Russian upheaval, and since, we have consistently maintained that Russia had to develop along capitalist lines. It has done so, and the history of the last twenty years, culminating in the present position, proves our case right up to the hilt. After futile attempts at isolation, Russia was compelled by her own economic development to enter the international competitive markets and into commercial and political relations with the rest of the capitalist world. Its foreign policy reflected the needs of its position in the international market. Ten years ago W. N. Ewer brought upon his head the opprobrium of some of the Labour and Communist Press because of an article he wrote in the Communist Labour Monthly, in which he made out the case that Russia’s foreign policy was a continuation of the foreign policy of the Czarist Government. Mr. Palme Dutt later had to publish a repudiation of the article in response to the official demand of the Communist Party. Russia’s subsequent development has shown a still further acceleration of the process to which Ewer drew attention. By whatever name the Communists like to call Russian efforts to achieve political and commercial dominance in China, and of similar efforts in S.E. Europe, they are, for those who understand, different only in degree from what has always been condemned by the Communists as imperialism. To-day the Soviet Government and its agents might give another name, but they cannot alter its essentially capitalist character. Russia’s foreign policy expresses needs which are governed by her position in the competitive cockpit of international markets, her need for markets and trade routes, and the acquisition of territories for dominance, or influence. Where the economic urge drives, pretty names will not alter the fact that this is the very thing that the Communists have been pretending to denounce for about twenty years.

The workers must face the fact that the Communist movement throughout the world is tied to the Russian Government; it cannot, dare not, consider the merits of any policy in the light of what ‘is in line with working-class interests. The Communist movement owes its first loyalty to Moscow. What is best in working-class interests is secondary, even if it is ever considered at all.

This is the lesson of events which Communists throughout the world must accept or, in default, mesmerise themselves into mental paralysis.

Harry Waite

Here and There: Is Hitler a Socialist? (1939)

The Here and There column from the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Is Hitler a Socialist?

A good deal of our time as a propagandist organisation has unfortunately had to be devoted to denouncing false ideas about Socialism as well as to explaining what Socialism really means. This has led us to strong criticisms of the Labour Party and other parties claiming to be working-class parties, which have very frequently been grossly misunderstood. Our position is a simple one regarding these parties. It is, briefly, that they do not stand for Socialism, that is to say, the common ownership by the whole of society of the means and instruments of production and distribution, and their democratic control by and in the interests of all. Some supporters of the Labour Party and others bristle like Christians rebuked for lack of faith when the position is stated thus. Yet that is the position. And the evidence of Labour Party programmes, newspapers and conferences provide overwhelming evidence of the fact. Worse—many thousands who describe themselves as Socialists have so vague an idea as to what Socialism means that they would not, so to speak, recognise it if they saw it. In a recent issue we commented on the report from Labour sources that the Nazi movement gained considerable support among workers in S.E. Europe because of Hitler’s skilful exploitation of anti-capitalist phraseology and the fact that his movement describes itself as National Socialist. The danger to the working-class movement through lack of sound knowledge, as in this example, should need little emphasis. Moreover, when that lack of knowledge is evident in quarters where “leadership” is looked for from the less informed, the danger can have tragic results. Witness Hamilton Fyfe in Reynolds’s (October 15th, 1939):-

  “Suppose Hitler were to make his National Socialism a reality ? Rudolf Hess, who is his closest friend, declared in public the other day that the Fuehrer would rather go Bolshevik than yield to the democracies. Was it a knowledge of this thought in Hitler’s mind which impelled Thyssen, the once-powerful German capitalist, to bolt when war began? He is now in Switzerland, I believe.

  Hitler has certainly shaken off the capitalist yoke. He climbed to power on the willing backs of financiers and industrialists. They thought they could keep him in order by threatening, if he defied them, to withdraw their shoulders and let him down. But, when he felt himself strong enough, he stamped on them; it was they who found themselves in the mud. Will he take the further step of finishing them off by making the Reich Socialist ?

  By doing this he would set up a strong claim to the assistance of Russia in a war against the capitalist Powers (Britain, France, Italy).”

Observe the reasoning: “Hitler has certainly thrown off the capitalist yoke.” (Note the emphasis, certainly.) Observe the process culminating in the view that Hitler would have “a strong claim to the assistance of Russia in a war against the capitalist Powers (Britain, France, Italy).”

How much further need such reasoning go before it justifies a holy “Socialist” war against capitalism. It is tragic to reflect this comes from one of the “profound” minds which influence the Labour Party following. Yet it bears out our lifelong case against the Labour Party—that State ownership or State control is not Socialism. And that is what Mr. Hamilton Fyfe sees in both Germany and Russia, hence, in his mind, the ease with which they might come together.

Such ideas, such men, are dangerous.

* * *

A New Role for the Communists

An interesting item of news from the war zone:—

   “Communists are coming to the fore again all over Germany, according to reports received from Swiss sources.

   Goering, Hess, Funk are backing them feeling that victory against the Allies cannot be achieved without their aid.

    Nazi speakers are now allowed to proclaim publicly that radical reforms to bring Germany into line with Russia are being prepared. All capitalism will be suppressed.

  The revived Communist Party is being renamed ‘the Popular Party’.”—(Evening Standard, October 21st, 1939.)

It may not be true. Nevertheless it could be true: in which case it would illustrate how small the real differences are between Germany and Russia. “All capitalism will be suppressed” would mean no more than centralisation in the hands of the State of the means of production on Russian lines. The move might deceive German workers for a time, but they would more than likely suspect it to be an astute move by the German Government to arrest criticism and discontent with the war. Anti-capitalist propaganda is likely to have unpleasant results for German capitalism later on.

* * *

Sour Grapes

The Daily Herald (October 10th, 1939) quotes from the Italian newspaper, Corriere Padano, the following: —

  “Voroshilov (Soviet Defence Commissar) and his companions, like all carrion in Bolshevik Russia, do not interest us in the slightest.

  We refuse a grain of esteem or an ounce of sympathy to the Bolsheviks, who are models of gross bestiality—living monsters who are serving the most infamous undertaking of human deceit, cruelty and degradation ever recorded.”

“Bolshevism” is about as popular with the Italian capitalist class at the moment as it will be with the German capitalist class later. The explanation, of course, has nothing whatever to do with the “ideological” differences of Fascism, Bolshevism or Nazism, but the clash of national interests.

Russia’s expansion into Poland has perhaps to a large extent neutralised the influence of Italy in the Balkans.

* * *

Long Live Poland—Communist Version

From Humanité, August 30th, 1936.

“LONG LIVE POLAND !”

By MAURICE THOREZ, 

Gen. Secretary of the C.P. of France.

  “Arriving in Paris this morning is General Rydz-Srnigly, Inspector-General of the Polish Army, and the most powerful man in his country. General Rydz-Smigly was the disciple and the comrade in arms of Marshal Pilsudski, founder of an independent Poland, who chose him to continue his work, and before dying commanded that “all the State functionaries, from the President of the Council downwards, were to render him respect and obedience. …” Although the interior regime in Poland is far from being a liberal democracy, and also General Rydz-Smigly once occupied Kiev, and defended Warsaw against the Red Army, we are none the less happy in saluting this morning France’s eminent guest. . . . Communists and Republicans consider that the continued independence of Poland is a guarantee of Peace in our troubled and anguished Europe. Deeply concerned regarding the future of our own country, attached passionately to the cause of peace, we observe with sympathy the efforts of the Polish people, who wish to preserve the independence of their country. . . .

We above all desire—and this is our reply to those who libel our Communist Party by maintaining that we are favourable to a “sacred war of the democracies against Fascism”—that Franco-Polish friendship should be guaranteed in order to preserve world peace, whatever may be the interior regime in Poland, that Poland which is, and must remain, independent.

And that is why this morning, in the name of the working people, in the name of the Communists in France, saluting the arrival of General Rydz-Smigly, we cry with all our heart “Long Live Poland.”

And now Poland has been “liberated” with the assistance of the Russian armies. Far from being “independent,” that country is now under the mutual “protection” of the German and Russian Governments. Socialists are not shocked. It is all in the dirty game of capitalist politics. If we register any feelings at all about the business it is only in bitter protest that the name of Socialism has been dragged into it by the Communists.

There is only one independence that is in line with working-class interests, and that is the independence which flows from the overthrow of their masters—the capitalist class.

Poland, as an independent State, was a product of the last war, the result of the collapse of three great Empires, by which it was previously surrounded. By the very nature of capitalist development its position as an “independent” State became difficult when those Empires regained their old strength. It may re-emerge again if and when the capitalist States which surround are too weak to resist it. And so the old game goes on, a game which has parallels in other parts of Europe and the capitalist world. A game which holds no interest for the workers and leaves unsolved the fundamental problems of working-class life, poverty and wage-slavery. Whichever capitalists dominate in Europe or elsewhere, those problems remain.

Socialists criticise the Communists and Russia because the latter has entered the capitalist cockpit.

Socialists aim at working-class independence, and instead of taking sides in the quarrels of the capitalists, work for the ending of capitalism.

* * *

Mr. Brockway and Socialism

Mr. Brockway, in the New Leader, tells his readers that he wrote “to the Webbs for contributions to the ‘N.L.’ symposium on the war.” He received a reply from Mrs. Webb, in which she excused herself on the grounds of “old age.”

Mr. Brockway comments thus: “They may feel blacked-out by age, but not even war will black out their Socialist work.”

Can we take it, Mr. Brockway, that the hoary Fabianism for which the Webbs stood and for which you express your appreciation as “Socialist work,” can be used as a measure of the “Socialism” the I.L.P. stands for?

Harry Waite

Finland, The Balts, and the Baltic (1939)

From the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Finland was for centuries a vassal to the Swedes, and the lands of the conquered were given to the powerful and faithful of the conquering baronage.

In 1809 the Russians seized Finland, and by possession of the Gulf, made safe the channels of St. Petersburg. Apart from this purpose, Russian Governments left the economic and political dominance of Finland to the Swedish barons, or came in only to buttress their oppressions.

The Swedish overlords had nothing but contempt for the conquered race. Its language was ostracised, its literature suppressed. Official positions were the perquisites of the Swedo-Finnish upper class. The holders were unimpeachable. The language, even of the courts of law, was Swedish, and into these courts the Finnish people had to take their interpreters or learn the language of the master class.

The Government was Parliamentary. Parliament consisted of four Houses. It was a delusive democracy.

1st, The House of Nobility, in which sat the Swedo-Finnish feudality—hereditary, non-elective, self-appointed.

2nd, The House of Clergy—elected by the clergy.

3rd, The House of Burghers—elected by property-holders within the cities.

4th, The House of Peasants—elected by property-holders outside the cities.

The nobility and clergy were, as usual, the two arms of tyranny. They exercised the veto against even the few upon whom the pretence of self-government had been conferred. The labouring, wage-earning mass had no vote.

In 1906 the Finnish workers revolted. The Four-house Parliament was swept out of existence, and the first reformed Parliament of Finland contained 20 Social Democrats out of a total membership of 200.

At the 1916 election the Social Democrats won a majority of seats (103 to 97), and from their membership formed the first Social Democratic Government of Finland.

In July, 1917, the Finnish Parliament carried an “Independence Bill.” The Russian Government (the Second Provisional) vetoed the Bill and dissolved the Parliament.

No sooner did the November Revolution take place in Russia than the reactionaries in Finland jumped to arms, overthrew the Finnish Government elected by the votes of the people, set up an arbitrary Government, in which there was not one Social Democrat. But, in a few weeks the Finnish militia and Labour organisations consolidated their forces, rose up, smashed the reactionaries, and restored to power the men elected in 1916.

Parliament reassembled. It declared for a Finnish Republic. Karl Manner, the Speaker of the 1916 Parliament, was made first President, and Oskar Tokoi, first Prime Minister.

Mr. Frank Anstey, M.P., member of the Australian Parliament, states in his book, “Red Europe” : “This Government the Allies refused to recognise, but they did recognise and subsidise every conspiracy for its overthrow.”

The Baltic being then controlled by Germany, and the Arctic ports icebound, the Allies could not send troops. The Swedish Government would have put in troops, but the Swedish Labour organisations threatened a general strike. The reactionary factions in Finland appealed to Germany.

In March, 1918, German warships and transports appeared off Helsingfors, and German troops were landed.

In April the Republic was overthrown and a Dictatorship set up under the protection of German bayonets.

Mr. Anstey, referring to this episode, says: 

“Thus once more was it demonstrated that the capitalist and landed classes, the master class in every form, prefer the occupation of their country by a foreign foe, to the government of their country by a working class that in any way threatens their predatory powers.”

In this same month, April, 1918, Mr. Haines, the United States Consul in Finland, made a report to the American Government. He reported that the landowners and money classes of Finland had asked the Swedish Government for assistance, but that the Swedish Labour organisations threatened a general strike if Swedish troops were sent to Finland. He stated that the help of the Allied Powers had been sought, but for various reasons was not available, and then he added:

“Therefore there was no alternative but to fall back upon Germany.”

No sooner was the German-sustained capitalist Government established in Finland than the British Government intimated its readiness to recognise it and to enter into diplomatic relations with it.

The united action of the reactionary White Guards and of the German army of occupation in Finland was secured by a united command. The supreme command was held by the German General, Von der Goltz, and command of the Finnish reactionary regiments by the Swedo-Finn, General Mannerheim.

Mannerheim used the German-trained Jaegers and men of the land-owning class, with such of their servitors as they could certify as safe. These made a force of about 50,000, and these, supported by the Germans under Von der Goltz, put the rebellious population to the sword. David Soskice told the Manchester Guardian there was “terrible slaughter,” and the London Times, referring to the ‘splendid’ work of Mannerheim, says that it broke the back of the rebellion, and that “the Germans quickly finished the job.” The Times casually mentions that, “out of about 80,000 prisoners, 30,000 are dead.” “Dead” is a sweet and luscious word for wholesale slaughter of rounded-up human sheep. Out of a population of 3,000,000, over one hundred thousand perished.

The Germans smoke-screened behind a so-called “Finnish Government,” rounded up and wiped out in cold-blooded “law and order” slaughter thousands of men, women and children. They arrested and imprisoned 80 members of the 1916 Finnish Parliament. Only one got out alive. Some were executed and others were reported “dead.”

In the latter part of 1918, when the German overlords found their populations were rising, their ships of war flying the Red Flag, and their warriors declining to fight, then they opened negotiations for an armistice. Allied commanders stipulated many things for Germany to do, but there was one thing it stipulated that Germany should not do. It was not to withdraw any more troops from the occupation of Finland or the Baltic Provinces.

From Finland the Germans had begun the withdrawal of their troops in September, and it became evident that without foreign bayonets the local reactionaries could not exist. In early October, while the war was still on, and weeks before the declaration of any Armistice, the Finnish butcher, General Mannerheim, left Finland, came to England, was the guest of the Government and, interviewed by the English Press, he spoke of the “splendid work done by the Germans.”

The working class crowds of Stockholm howled at Mannerheim, “You murderer,” and in Norway the Government so feared a popular rising that they asked him to keep out of the country, but Havelock Wilson’s Union carried this man backward and forward without protest.

It is to the credit of the Finnish working class that they have kept the spirit of class-consciousness alive.

In March, 1919, on a jerrymandered franchise, with 100,000 of their best dead, or in gaols, or off the rolls, with no free speech and with a rigid suppression of working-class newspapers, they scored 80 out of 200 seats.

They have learned much by bitter experience. If they had got a majority their representatives would have been imprisoned or shot.

The working class of Finland are still doing their best in the circumstances in which they find themselves; they still lean too much to reformism, but they have a noble record, and in the coming struggle we can depend upon them to continue to do their bit.

The chief seaports and cities of the Baltic Provinces were founded by German traders in the thirteenth century. From that date they have been the master class, controllers of land, finance and industry, the exclusive holders of local political power, and the imposers of economic slavery upon the local races.

For two centuries the German Balts were the staunch supporters of Czarist Governments. In return they were permitted to be sole rulers in the Baltic Provinces, and Czarist soldiery were always at their disposal for the subjection of the rebellious workers.

The Baltic masses, therefore, staggered under a double yoke, that of the German Balts and that of the Russian bureaucracy—the former were the economic taskmasters, the latter the military oppressors. The German Balts and Russian autocracy were akin, but since the Balts came closer to the daily life of the people, the Baltic masses had a more implacable hatred against the German Balts than even against the Russian autocracy.

The Russian revolution of 1905 showed how intense was the hatred of the Baltic peasants to their brutal Teutonic landlords, and only the influx of many Cossack regiments saved the Baltic Barons from utter extermination.

On April 12th, 1917, the first Provisional Government of Russia granted “Home Rule” to the Baltic Provinces, and as such autonomy meant government by peasants and proletarians, the Baltic baronage of landlords, trade lords and financiers saw their robber power disappearing. Thus they agitated for intervention, annexation, salvation of their perquisites and possessions from the wrath of the Baltic people, and their cry for liberation was taken up by Germany.

On January 2nd, 1918, Herr Vorst, the correspondent in Russia of the Berliner Tageblatt, put the case thus: 

“Should the Baltic Provinces remain united with Russia or obtain self-government, the social and economic predominance of the German Balts will be abolished through the uprising of the people. The German Balts look to Germany for protection against the local proletariat.”

The Brest Treaty (March, 1918) left the Baltic Provinces of Esthonia and Livonia within the Russian State, and Soviet Russia left to these Provinces self-government. At once a deputation of Baltic capitalists visited Berlin and appealed for the occupation of their country by a foreign State. The German Government complied, and thereafter German steel and German guns kept the people in subjection.

And when Germany could no longer do the work Britain took up the task, and either acted alone or in collaboration with Germany.

On Sunday, December 29th, 1918, the local Lithuanian regiments held a meeting in Riga and declared for Lenin and the Soviet Government of Russia.

On December 30th the joint action of German and British troops was agreed to by their respective Governments.

On January 1st, 1919, the Lithuanian troops were designated “mutineers,” and German and British troops marched out against them, overcame them, and compelled the survivors to carry arms against their own race and country.

On January 2nd the working population rose en masse; the German soldiery refused to fight and the British were compelled to evacuate Riga and the surrounding country.

In this situation it was determined to secure high-priced “volunteers” for the unreliable conscript armies. The “National Committee” of German Baltic Barons, the Committee that twelve months previously had petitioned Germany to annex the Baltic Provinces, were heavily financed by the Allied Powers to organise a German volunteer force, and recruiting offices were at once established in Berlin and other cities. The Manchester Guardian, January 8th, said, “The irony of the situation is that the German Baltic Barons are the most reactionary gang to be found anywhere in the world.”

In the middle of January came the Spartacist risings in Germany, as a protest, amongst other things, against the German-British intervention in the Baltic Provinces.

During January and February, 1919, British ships of war were convoying German troops from one part of the Baltic to the other. Von der Goltz was invited across from Finland. He took charge of the Baltic land operations while the British Fleet protected his rear.

What has followed is now current history.

The working men of the Baltic and Scandinavian countries are well informed, and are watching the events now transpiring with intense interest.

They, like us, are caught in the web of conflicting imperial interests; the dropping of the mask by Soviet Russia has caused a hurried regathering of forces.

The present line-up is not likely to be permanent; a regrouping of Powers may be expected before the war is over. The class-conscious know where they stand and those who are not at present in that category will by hammer-blows be driven into an understanding of their position.

Charles Lestor

Our Sixpenny Stunt (1939)

Party News from the November 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our “sixpenny stunt” is still in operation. All you have to do is to send a sixpenny postal order to the Literature Secretary, 42, Great Dover Street, together with the address of an interested sympathiser, and we will send him or her the Socialist Standard for three consecutive months. A brief note will accompany the first month’s copy. At the expiration of the three months we shall write again, inviting the new reader to become a subscriber and to read our other published literature.

Some readers have gained the impression that the “sixpenny stunt” had been dropped owing to the fact that it is not announced in every issue of the Socialist Standard. For reasons of space, however, it is not possible to reproduce the same notice every month. Readers will understand, however, that this method of arousing interest in new circles is still in force, and will continue to be carried out until further notice.

Germany, the Danube and Rumania (1939)

From the October 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard 

Rumania is in the picture just now and we have been informed that she would like to be our ally, in spite of the pressure Germany is exerting to induce King Carol to link up with the Axis

On January 16th last, according to the Economist (April 29th), M. Gafencu, Rumanian Minister for Foreign Affairs, was present at a meeting held in Galatz by the National Re-generation Society. In his speech he referred to Rumania’s interest in the Danube, for recently this time-honoured river and artery of Europe had attracted the attention of politicians and economists in all the countries through which it flows, and not least Rumania. M. Gafencu said that the Rumanian Danube must serve as a show-window turned towards the East and the Black Sea, and that this fact placed certain duties upon the shoulders of Rumania.

The importance of the Danube has been increased lately by various plans for canals connected with its upper and lower reaches. On May 11th, 1931, the German Government promulgated a law for the construction of the Rhine-Main-Kelheim (Danube) canal. This canal, which is to be finished in 1945, forms a part of the German economic campaign, and the Rumanian Press talks of Baghdad as the goal towards which it is aimed. It will carry vessels up to 1,200 tons.

On November 19th, 1938, a Convention was signed between Germany and Czecho-Slovakia for the construction of another canal from Kosel, on the Oder, through Moravska Ostrana to the Danube above Bratislava. For several years the Rumanian Government has had in its archives plans for the construction of a canal to unite, by a straight line, the Danubian port of Cernavoda with Constantza.

The voyage of cargo steamers would be reduced by nearly 200 miles by loading at Constanza instead of at Braila or Galatz. Below Braila the average depth of the river is about 24 feet, so that it is navigable for sea-going vessels. Higher up the depth decreases.

The Government is at present studying this proposal.

The most far-reaching proposal which, if it were ever carried out, would radically affect the Balkan countries, is for a waterway running from the Timok river, a Danubian tributary below Belgrade, and by the Nishava to Nish, thence down the River Morava to the River Vardar and finally to the Mediterranean at Salonika. This canal would shorten the goods route from Central Europe to Salonika by 900 miles. It would, of course, kill the lower Danube ports of Braila, Galatz and Sulind. It is interesting to recall that when the Czecho-Slovakian business was agitating the public mind, Mr. Walter Runciman was sent by the Government to make certain representations—he is in the shipping business.

Germany is aiming at connecting the Rhine and the Danube by means of a large waterway; this, she calculates, would enable her to tap all the resources of Central Europe, and if she could also succeed in getting control of the proposed canal to Salonika she would, in addition, be in a position to play a strong hand politically in the Mediterranean.

Dr. Schacht, the German Finance Minister, advocated intensive industrialisation as the best means of solving Germany’s post-war economic problems, and this immediately brought him up against Germany’s shortage of raw materials and the question of currency.

A nation faces a difficulty if it launches into intensive industrialisation without sufficient raw materials in its own territory and without adequate reserves of capital. Raw materials must be imported and paid for—in foreign currency. Barbara Ward, in “The International Share-out,” states in this connection, “This is not a difficult transaction if the industrialised country is able to sell goods abroad in large enough quantities to create a favourable balance of trade, or if it has enough capital to invest overseas and receive interest in the shape of raw materials or currency.” The situation for the German capitalists was doubly difficult. The post-war years were years of growing economic nationalism, when every nation was engaged in a bitter struggle to produce and sell goods rather than to buy them, and Germany found it more and more difficult to place her manufactures. And the war of 1914-1918 and the inflation had wiped out Germany’s capital reserves. She was herself a debtor country in a world which refused to take her goods as service on her debt, and demanded that the transaction be carried out in gold. Behind the high tariff barriers of America and France the gold silted up, and Dr. Schacht felt that Germany’s position was extremely precarious. Therefore, in 1926, he began to advocate a colonial policy, not because he believed colonial raw materials to be a solution of Germany’s industrial problems, but because he argued that the return of the Colonies might ease the strain on Germany’s currency. Germany’s difficulty, so his argument might have run, is to find enough foreign currency to buy the essentials, such as iron and tin and zinc, or any other important metal which at present was being bought from foreign countries with foreign currency. If Colonies were returned to us we could buy these primary products with our own money and set free a corresponding amount of our scanty supplies of foreign currency to buy more of the essential raw materials, which are only to be found in the territories of foreign sovereign States.

Germany’s revival of the Colonial question was not due to the traditional policy of supplies and markets, but to Dr. Schacht’s thesis of underpinning the German mark. Germany’s exchange position was rendered much worse by the international slump. 1929 brought an end to American lending and the retreat of panic-stricken nations behind tariff walls. Germany’s export trade was damaged catastrophically. When Hitler came to power in 1933 he was faced with the problem of some eight million unemployed. He sought a way out in a policy of controlled inflation and internal recovery. The men were brought back to work, but the position in regard to foreign currency grew worse. Germany’s internal boom, coming at a time when the rest of the world was still wallowing in the trough of economic depression, cut German industry off still further from the general flow of world trade. Her export trade, nevertheless, was a vital necessity, for without it she could not secure foreign currency, and without foreign currency she could not purchase essential materials.

During the first two years the problem was simplified by conditions in the world market of primary products. There had been a general fall in prices, and for a considerable period the prices of most raw materials were ludicrously low. Germany could obtain supplies at this low rate, and she did not feel the pinch of her currency shortage too severely. In 1935 the position changed. Slowly the markets of the world recovered. Great Britain, France, and the United States had all embarked on vast armament programmes. Their needs came into direct collision with Germany’s, and as the prices of the primary products rose and the scramble for them increased, Germany’s position grew more and more unfavourable. She found it difficult to compete in the open market, and other Powers were not so ready to conclude “clearing” agreements with her. They preferred free multilateral trade.

Germany might at this juncture have inflated her currency. Such a step would have lowered costs and helped the export trade to compete in foreign markets. Or she might have made a determined effort to secure a foreign loan. She did neither. Memories of the 1923 inflation were too vivid for the first step. As for the second, the Nazis claimed to have come to power in order to redeem Germany from “the slavery of foreign Jewish finance capital.”

Their solution of the problem was the “Four Years’ Plan” and the drive for self-sufficiency. The aim of this total mobilization of the country’s resources was said to be to reduce its dependence upon foreign supplies, and it is significant that the Colonial question became a recurrent refrain in German propaganda about the same time as the Four Year Plan was launched.

“If critics protest,” says Miss Ward, “that the game is not worth the candle, because the Colonies do not produce Germany’s basic needs, the Germans reply that, although the Colonies do not produce iron or copper bauxite, or cotton or wool, they do produce, and could be made to produce, more of certain other materials, which Germany must at present buy with foreign exchange. The recovery of the Colonies would thus set free a certain amount of foreign currency, which could be used to buy the really essential metals elsewhere. If after this critics still protest that the sum saved is too small to be weighed against the risks of the transaction, the Germans can reply that if they find it worth while to legislate about waste tooth-paste containers, colonies are not too insignificant to be of interest to them.”

Germany’s moves in Spain can be understood if we take the above into consideration. She was searching for raw materials she could not afford to buy. Every time a crisis has developed she has taken advantage of the stagnation in trade that resulted to bring off a barter agreement. When the Germans were marching into Czecho-Slovakia, Hitler was making a deal with the Argentine, bartering railway material for wheat. Airplanes obtained as a result of the seizure of Czechoslovakia were offered to France in exchange for badly-needed foreign currency.

Enough has been said to show something of what is involved in the struggle.

Charles Lestor