Big Business Fears Defense Tax Bill As Wedge Towards Gov't Ownership
OLIVER, BRYCE
Big Business Fears Defense Tax Bill As Wedge Towards Gov't Ownership By Bryce Oliver IWEYD News Commeirfcrorl Defense AMERICA'S five-year defense plan, almost jeertain of passage by Congress,...
...Appeasement of the dictators will be urged by the Lindberghs, Fords, Mooneys, Coughlins and their numerous henchmen, and with considerable chance of success...
...np°j/ *e ab*°lute moralist can .afford to reject "victims" or «sseri*»" necessary though they may be to the building of our social structuw...
...coming e\'ery _ day: armIS and 'lQ1l..IJ1fIt .• 000 men...
...It may be a good deal worse...
...Watching man with the eyes of a sensitive friend, Gorki' once wrote, or with the stern- glance of a judge, sympathizing with him, laughing at him, admiring his courage, cursing his nullity— true literature rises above life...
...the passage of each hour makes his victory less likely...
...Private business advices from Washington indicate that America is closer to public ownership of essential industries than is generally realized...
...w'arplanes in J Il ly...
...From Lamprecht to Bismarck, from the Kaiser to Hitler, the Will to Power, Machtpolitik, Wcltpolitilc have guided the destinies and conditioned the mentality of the German people...
...If the United States allows England to sink, it is merely bringing...
...In this situation the Axis propaganda machine will start operating, with a view to bringing about further internal disorganization...
...But the most important move toward a really democratic defense plan is already taking shape in departmental orden...
...According to fjjji Street reports, this Republican-headed War Department/has drafted a bill, to be presented as soon as conscription U adopted, fixing a moratorium on all debts for those called Into active service...
...If this analysis of the situation is correct— land «ven Wall Street admits it is correct—the war and America's defense imply a change of system to public ownership, and by democratic methods...
...The public, of course, which pays?jjj?f.'the prodpjctiotff^-and the profits—thereby pays for the cost of the plant expansion...
...Such a threat is the greatest possible deterrent to capital support for the entire conscription program...
...The entire membership of Congress is eager to adjourn by Oct...
...This means the rush act, a minimum of debate, and acceptance of the system already in the terms of a bill...
...Such a gigantic "squeeze play" is by no means "imminent" but in terms of days or weeks "it could begin within a year after England was crushed, unless the United States decided to go totalitarian and dance to Hitler's tunes, which is hardly likely...
...But the difficulty in our complicated modern world is to make enough fairly intelligent leaders of opinion see the probiem of "invasion" in a light quite different from that in which it is usually presented by fundamentalist isolationists and interventionists...
...I HAVE no desire (nor a?n I capable) to dig deep in the debris of German * metaphysics to attempt an explanation of this Teutonic braggadocio, this egotism and naive self-love...
...T*HIS is the real lesson of the war so far as America is * concerned...
...at t>e alloat in Jul y 1943, to...
...Should he win, no military expert thinks he will get the British fleet if there is a fleet to get...
...that they are too "great and homogenous" a race "to go along with other peoples...
...Italy's fleet is a menace only in the Mediterranean...
...as good as any in their day, England was able to maintain communications across the Atlantic...
...things in life are conditioned by time and space and'when conditions SO*** there must necessarily follow a change in tactics , . ^ At the-present period in history labor has everything to lose if"*!*?*' should come out victorious...
...alld 50,000...
...On the basis of this...
...Yet this is only half the story...
...Perhaps invasion today would not take the same crude form it once took...
...And it is only logical that labor, (M...
...Again in 1812 England conducted landing operations, and burned Washington...
...MacLeish's assertion that writers have :M*eh a great power to govern the course of history...
...T is, in the first place, by no means certain that Hitler" is baffled by the English Channel, nor do the "rebellious" Europeans seem to be giving the Gestapo much trouble...
...that civilization was Pothh* W a vast edifice of sham, and the war, instead of its crumbling, was its fftUe* and most ultimate expression...
...Hence the increasing emphasis by Nasi Ger-many's economic spokesmen, such as Walter Punk, on the German methods of conscripting industry and capital Axis Economic, Political Invasion of U. S. Threatens Western Democracy By Ferdinand Lundberg Invasion COME of our friends who whimsically want *^ us t? "keep out of war" by burying our heads in the sand have crocheted a comforting 'theory about the impossibility of invading the United States...
...Economically most of Latin America is dependent upon whoever controls the Eul opean market...
...Such operations would, for a long time to come, be impossible...
...He suggests that "perhaps the luxury of complete confession, the uttermost despair, the farthest doubt should be denied themselves by,"Writers living in any but the most orderly and settled times...
...Germany he said "is not a geographical or political concept but the sum total of all Germans who think like Germans, fed like Germans and who are possessed of the German, will...
...But the point is really this: if Hitler defeats England the United States will automatically be at war with Axis conquerors of vast vision...
...They were also "books- filled with passionate contempt for the statements of conviction,, of purpose and...
...These men and women receive the WPA wages only for ti» period of training...
...Its weakness (it ignores political and economic realities) is not evident to most persons...
...1*HE issue comes to a head in the final defense tax bill...
...Hitler and his allies utilize peace treaties merely as steps to further aggrandizement, as their attitude toward the submissive French government of Vichy demonstrates...
...economic fact...
...Our "socialists" and pacinstJsofs»"*» merely reveal the shallowness of their minds when thev fail to reati...
...Undoubtedly the United States would be able to obtain a relaxation of the pressure against itself from time to time., by making economic and political concessions of various kinds, but each such concession would represent a partial and perhaps painful /defeat...
...To the latter I should merely like to point out in the words o? fiechanov, the eminent Russian Social Democrat, that even though sods** are confirmed and principled advocates of peace, thev have a moral T8j« ¦ ??l?iS^WErS ,° a?^ression- If they are Internationalists they are help the proletariat of other countries...
...If these men are right, then indeed we may fear for the future...
...It would be different, to be sure, if the war ended with a negotiated peace that preserved national rights and privileges all around, but with the totalitarians there can be no negotiated peace...
...Right this day, the WPA is assigning men and women to big industrial plants for training in the work of plant expansion...
...Hitler, however, is forcing a political merger of all once dissident powers, and in Europe only England now stands outside his orbit...
...In other words, a company invests five million dollars to expand production...
...And they left behind them in many minds the conclusion that not only the war and war issues but all issues, all moral issues, were false— were fraudulent—were intended to deceive...
...It will either have to join this world, reorganizing itself painfully in order to do so, or it will have to prepare its political, economic and social institutions' for mortal struggle against the dictatorial entente...
...Hitherto the United States has been protected, not by water and distance, but by division of power among many countries of the world...
...T3E War Department itself, headed by the Republican Henry Stimson, has caught the fever...
...the revolver nearer its own head...
...What, then, is the prospect ? If Hitler defeats England—and he stands at least a fifty-fifty chance;—the United States will be confronted by an explosive political fact: that it exists in a totalitarian world...
...And Schelling, Fichte's disciple and heir, told the Germans that they;.are, destined "for a great mission...
...For each Thomas Mann, for each Erich Maria Remarque, there were in Germany hundreds like P. de Lagarde wha told the Germans in his Deutsche Schriften that they must "not be human bat divine, not free but Germans...
...True enough...
...To Americans reared in the spirit of'democracy such outbursts of national egotism are altogether incomprehensible...
...i We have here, of course, a fatuous notion that'may well become the prelude to disaster if it" is thrust deeply enough into public consciousness...
...Na.vy...
...After the training is complete, they will receive the standard pay of the industry...
...With the rapid passing of eacli 'iIIIIL there comes an intensifica t ion of...
...The theory goes as follows: "Hitler has yet to conquer the British Isles...
...Later, Axis diplomatic and political pressure will be added to economic and social pressure...
...In the west will be Japan and Russia, frowning across the Pacific...
...For if that were so how can one exp?a» V* acts of heroism...
...One may question, of course, Mr...
...This political combination, its most active members being to date Germany, Italy and Japan, will see spread before them in the western hemisphere the richest loot of all...
...But the United State», born uhder a lucky star with a rabbit's fooi in one of the eagle's claws, is safe, and may go on dreaming of sweetness and light...
...His s?cred duty is to probe deeper into the meaning of life, of existence, of social catastrophes and great events, and not merely depict their external, superficial appearances...
...What was wrong with our post-war writers was not that they expressed "bewilderment" and "bitterness," certainly not because they failed to censor themselves, but that they functioned as moralists and not as artists...
...me$ns that a company which now invests;five million dollars to .tfcke care of expanded production, for the purpose of defense, would" get its money back but would not own the expanded plant in the end...
...But one must not forget that the Wille zar Macht—all, incidentally, that was retained of Nietzsche's great ideas in Germany—has "for decades been instilled into the.blood and soul of every German...
...These are indestructible military truths <vhich remain valid in spite of vague talk about ihe 'grave danger of invasion.' They should be pasted in the hats of all Americans susceptible to sudden rushes of the blood to the head...
...Tht however, cannot operate with absolute concepts, which is the antithesis to tr» ? .lmUSx reahze that not a!wa>'s must the life of an individual be above that of society...
...He would have to police millions of rebellious Europeans...
...The Axis might gain Allies in Latin America...
...Having convinced themselves that the particular «* in which they participated as individuals was bad, they drew the conclusion that we must reject all wars...
...It is true that the novelist is primarily concerned with the indivhtaal, $* war, as a collective phenomenon, completely obliterates the individual's 1» and person But there,are other values-perhaps greater ones-that are toteoI for the individual's freedom of thought and action-values that ¦** benefit humanity as a whole...
...all words, distrustful of all moral judgments of better and worse, then it is incapable of using the only weapon with which fascism can...
...MacLeish, "thd young generation in America is distrustful of...
...They cannot be shrugged off by unscrupulous interventionists who imply that a murderous marauder baffled by the English Channel would find the Atlantic Ocean a duck pond...
...Charles Yale Harrison recently suggested that the possession of a Thqmas Mann or an Erich Maria Remarque by Germany did not change the course of events there...
...he wpiild have, to bury his dead, overcome starvation and pestilence, sell his war-weary peopleya distant war...
...all traes, said more than once that in a country invaded by a ?ot?0^ «!" I!L 18 !nbJected to a double tyranny: the tyranny of the mm?fi the tyranny of the native capitalists Defense Time Table HE U. S. has on hand today: a ___ navy of 399 warships ;' 5,500 ~, . mOore beinjt produced monthly ; 5~ ·. with 3 light tanks being assem~ a: 52.000 high-powered Garand rifles...
...The trouble with ¦ our post-war novelists was that, inspired by influences alien to literature, they believed that it was not enough for them 4o porttsj the i,fc of their time with accuracy and understanding...
...It can be done again, especially if the people of the country rely upon any agency other than their own energy to save them...
...The issue is whether the defense effort is to be strictly democratic or strictly capitalistic — whether the United States is to take the same courageous action toward public ownership of the defense plants...
...be fought— the moral conviction that fascism is evil and that a free society of free men is Worth fighting for...
...Already, capital is frightened...
...t * * * AN artist, of course, must have a point of view...
...In the light of American history Archibald MacLeish is undoubtedly right when he chides our novelists for their light-minded words about all wars and moral principles—"words which have borne bitter and dangerous fruit...
...he would have to work out his destiny in the East —the Balkans, the Near East and Joseph Stalin...
...Invasion to the literal-minded public is apt to mean landing parties at Coney Island, German destroyers off the Battery, and invasion in the sense under discussion here does not take such operations into even passing consideration...
...1.000 new w'arplanes...
...the plants...
...At the core of this debate—hidden from publie view to a large extent—is an issue which goes much mor* deeply into the conflict between democratic liberty and authoritarian oligarchy...
...Since this bill will soften the blow of conscription for thousands of families (read votes) the financial district has no hope of defeating it...
...The Axis combination, once the anti-Comintern bloc but now including the Comintern, will not need to learn to operate the British Navy...
...For the United States will have no field for operations 'against the victors, will be forced, more or less, to string along...
...At first the war will be economic, with the Axis getting in the first blow in the form of the deflationary demolition of the British Empire...
...Seized by the spirit of MM*** —to change the world, to improve it, to set it right—they assumed the oi social philosophers and moralists and failed to integrate their nto a complete image...
...He must never, however, be dissuaded from performing the function of an artist...
...If," continues Mr...
...rards the pal' " • 2-ocean Nll' Y of 701 shi ps by JaauaJ 1...
...will be sufficient by Allgllllt JtIl .. 000,000 men...
...would he of no use against airplanes moving up from Latin America, and it would not take much of an Axis force to knock over any country down there...
...A great social catastrophe arouses the awe, ecstasy and the creativentess of the artist, but he must never be completely subjected to the "issues of the moment...
...Even Jaures, the greatest enemy of m«M...
...There has been a tendency among some sincere libersl»-such men as Senator Norris for example—to deplore conscription «f manpower as the opening wedge of dictatorship...
...Warning- was uttered by Nebraska's great liberal, George W. Norria, that if lives are to be conscripted the anti-conscription forces will go the limit for conscription of capital and plant structure...
...1, and the defense tax bill is due for final adoption by Sept...
...knuckle under to a political upstart...
...Yet that was before' the days of steam and motor ships, before the era of the airplane and submarine, before the days when first-class powers like Germany, Japan and Russia were vast workshops and arsenals...
...Careful study of all the possibilities inherent in the visualised collapse of England under Axis sledge-hammer blows suggests that the United States is entering the period of gravest danger, in its history...
...This is expected to be the argujasi of Candidate Willkie...
...OUT before the United States is confronted •"^ with the political fact of living in a totalitarian world it will, immediately after the collapse of England, be confronted by an even more serious...
...S *T ^T" r3ther rcject the whole structure because to him * rights of the individual stand higher than the rights of society...
...But the amazing part of the story is that the proponents of...
...i'" On thto production t i me-table ~. I step-up of Garand ri fle~ to SOG dajJJ~ 1940...
...Bat according.to these same Wall Street advices, the issue will certainly creep into the campaign...
...Every dockyard and shipyard in Europe will be at its disposal, which is to say practically the entire shipbuilding industry of the world...
...The bill means public ownership of essential industries within five years...
...If this analysis is correct,'* it implies that some socialization of the nation may be under way and through democratic methods...
...so assigned...
...Big Business Fears Defense Tax Bill As Wedge Towards Gov't Ownership By Bryce Oliver IWEYD News Commeirfcrorl Defense AMERICA'S five-year defense plan, almost jeertain of passage by Congress, encompasses the socialization of industry, according to analyses by Wall Street powers...
...Arms and equipm...
...the liberals of Congress are now coming' around to the belief that the plants which are amortized nhjlthis five-year plan should in reality belong to the people Who pert tip the...
...already, some 5,000 have gone on regular industrial pay rolls, and by October, it is under-stood that some 250,000 men and women now on WPA will be molded in this way back into the industrial plant of the nation...
...anti-aircraft guns by ,January 19...
...If England goes there will.be no one in th<- world %i??Axis with which w cooperate, Novelists' 'Defeatism' Mirrored PosNWar Disillusionment in America By Leon Dennen War Culture \Co3icludedfrom last issue) 1IIHILE the failure, of our liberal critics and social philosophers to grain the ™ essence of present-day events and: to define boldly and lucidly their attitude towards war is inexcusable, the problem of our novelists in relation to war is more, complex, even though no less disastrous...
...On top of this will be the entire German, Italian and Japanese Navies, plus naval contributions from Russia and conquered France...
...Assuming that Hitler could, in the coarse of years, provide himself with a sizeable blue water fleet, he would then face the problem of getting himself naval and air bases in the Western Hemisphere and of protecting his lines of communication to these bases...
...Egypt, Babylonia, Persia, Greece, China and Rome were invaded,jail the nations of modern Europe have been invaded countless times...
...an come out by !'Oovember of tlriI...
...German bombers commute «n the hour to all points in England, and are unquestionably causing m>uch damage...
...He is, however, treading on dangerous ground when he tells our writers to "censor" themselves...
...The Navy could not coyer, every approach...
...Both sides know that the private owners of the plants will never be able to pay off that mortgage...
...France, according to the Italian press, is to be completely "liquidated...
...The clearest indication of the importance of this trend, even in a conservative Congress, is the fact that the Hitler Government's propaganda service in the United State» is attacking the tax bill in its present form...
...2i ." Without attempting to "judge these writers" Archibald MacLeish insists that they must face the fact that thte books they wrote in the years just after the war have done more to disarm democracy in the face of fascism than any other single influence...
...Who does not know that the United States is the most anti-militarist nation on this earth...
...and this squeeze play will he every bit as painful, if it eventuates, as any acUaal occupation, which could come later after th%>country is thoroughly softened up by economic deflation and the propaganda of semiseditious groups...
...This...
...In his much-discussed essay on "Post-war Writers and Pre-war Readers," Archibald MacLeish declared that the war novels of writers like John Dos Pasaos, Ernest Hemingway, Charles Yale Harrison, E. E. Cummings, Thomas -Boyd, Richard Aldington—some of pur outstanding contemporary novelists— -were "not only books written against the hatefulness and cruelty and filthiness of war...
...nor can he avoid being subjected to the "pressure of time...
...money—that is...
...But with the aid of modern techniques and grand strategy invasion of the United States is a lively and relatively immediate possibility...
...15, at the latest...
...the conscription of capital in this manner are now in the major-ity...
...The British empire is the key arch oi the international financial and economic struct ure, and once this arch is broken the whole structure will fall...
...1 Industry and1 capital arc now opposing this measure, and men like Senator Burke of Nebraska, leading proponent of the conscription of manpower, represent the opponents...
...t I "AyE altogether left out of this discussion the intcllecual adbeWB*^ Staliruem-whose thinking is done for them by the bureaucrats 4'* Kremlin—and the motley assortment of holier-than-thou "socialista^ ¦»•<** and near-pacifists who regard all wars as imperialist wars or who fcelfew W an active resistance to war is evil...
...The notion "that Hitler can defeat England and carry out the political, physical and' military prerequisites for conquest in the Western Hemisphere quickly enough to make his invasion of the U. S. 'imminent' is part of the interventionist war of nerves...
...The stock and bond markets will fall, commodity markets will follow, and in their wake will go a train of price declines reaching into every corner of American life...
...Nor is it true that every human being values M» •* life above all other things...
...But most of this theory is bound to seem plausible to wishful thinkers...
...Although Congress and the nation are now in the midst of furious debate over the conscription of manpower, this is not the vital issue of the American defense program...
...The United States in a world that acknowledges the Axis as the conqueror of Britain will be in a position much like that of Czechoslovakia in pre-Munich Europe, surrounded on aU sides by formidabie enemies...
...There would be no need to sink the American Navy if the Axis Powers initially sought footholds only in Latin America...
...Yet England in the IJSth century Mad little, difficulty, landing armies on American shores ¦ despite the opposition of formidable ¦French: fleets...
...200 new "heavy""" tanks in .January 1943...
...Such footholds might be gained by the familiar process of gradual penetration, beginning in the guise of commercial activity to the step of establishing airplane bases and commercial airlines, and then negotiating the next step of building submarine bases, e t c Threatened on all sides, the United States would not know what section of i ts coastline to defend heavily...
...All the strategic sea-lanes leading to this hemisphere will be dominated by hostile forces, and some of the sea-lanes connecting the northern and southern hemispheres will be in dispute, subject to raids by submarines...
...This bill contains the dual principle of levying excess profits taxes and a plan for amortizing p^tnt expansions, to take care of defense, production, within .five years...
...We make sport of second lieutenants, and until recently a soldier was regarded as little better than a good-for-nothing and a general as a martinet whose primary purpose was to wiggle more" money out of Congress for armaments so that he might have more ammunition with which tu shoot down strikers...
...In the Atlantic will be the force of all Europe, under firm control of Berlin and Rome...
...For no one who reads American history can come to the conclusion that it is the destiny of this country ever to...
...But if he should get any of it, the problem of learning to man it, according to naval experts, would take almost two years...
...Finally he would have to sink the U. S. Fleet, cripple its coast defenses and destroy its air force, land an expeditionary force and wipe out the U. S. army...
...But if democracy works to the extent now feared by Wall Street, then conscription is surely not without its blessings...
...October..-l943, with complete...
...the public...
...pansion (through taxation) the people have a mortgage r0...
...Part of his own comparatively small navy is designed for the short distances of the North Sea...
...The investment is guaranteed, by the government and the company is permitted to cover its five million dollars with profits within five years...
...Economic disorganization and uncertainty throughout the United States upon the fall of England will be much like that of early 1933...
...But is.it not a fact that even the great Fichte wrote pathetically in his Speeches to'the German People that "If you (Germans) perish, humanity will perish without any hope for resurrection...
...I T is the Axis squeeze play, rather than literal * invasion, that is imminent once England is out of the way...
...Repercussions in the United States will be almost instantaneous...
...It is well understood in Berlin that if conscription of capital is undertaker by democratic methods it cannot be accomplished by totalitarian methods...
...The moment word comes over the wires that Hitler is master of the British Isles severe economic deflation will be the order of the day throughout the United States, notwithstanding all existing government controls...
...The issue, boiled down to the essential facts is: "Who will own the expanded industrial plant—'the government or private-industryJ" i As placed before ; the people by the opposing candidates and their parties, one side will argue that what is contemr plated is confiscation...
...Before inquiring into the.real possibilities, however, let us scan the theory "of those .who would have us keep out of war by blinding ourselves to the cold facts...
...Farthest doubt, as Edmund Wilson pointed out, and uttermost despair are not "luxuries" but the expression of the "bewilderment or the bitterness wrung from the human spirit by precisely those periods of history which are the reverse of orderly and settled...
...Nothing in Europe, Africa or Asia compares with it, and the struggle for control of Europe itself is merely a struggle for the keys to the outside world—Africa, Asia, South America, North America...
...It will apply to installment sales, home mortgages, and rents not in excess of $80 a month...
...The expansion would belong to the public...
...Some hint of the serious nature of this side of the defense debate crept into the Senate last week as anti-conscription-ists, led by Senator Burton K. Wheeler, pounded away at the peace-time conscription principle...
...How can one explain the great sacrifices wrought M throughout history...
...velt and the spokesmen for the New Deal, are prepare* to argue that since the people advance the funds for piant-e...
...And despite hostile fleets...
...equipment for l.ZGO,OOO men...
...They may be forever impossible...
...Down by the water 521 war!dri...
...it was not eW«*t f* them to criticize it.with a penetrating sagacity...
...In the period of economic demoralization the United States will find itself faced by the probability of diplomatic, political, economic and military encirclement...
...Already, some 75,000 men are...
...t>e increased to a 1.500 figure i n J...rt.t 1141, that date, too, 6 new light fIIIb:-.m • trundled out e\"ery day, and by JilJ.D&l .. e hal' e 1,000 Garand's daih' an4 a~ef 1,500 tanks...
...of belief on which the war of 1914-1918 was fought...
...capital should struggle energetically and with all the means at »«?*?5 against fasewt-aggression...
...Wherein the writer quoted errs initially— and perhaps purposely—is in supposing that it is all merely a question of Hitler, when what we see in action is a cooperative entente consisting thus far of Germany, Italy, Russia, Spain and Japan and likely to include—if Hitler heats .England!—Scandinavia, Holland, Belgium, France, Switzerland, Turkey and all the Balkans, Such is the political combination the United States will have to face, and not Hitler alone...
...IT has been done once...
...The other side, represented by Stsjg...
...Assuming Hitler wins, before he could undertake .military conquests in the West, he would have to settle many accounts in Europe...
...The magic talisman that protects the United States, according to this theory,-is water and distance...
Vol. 23 • August 1940 • No. 34
