'Leftist' War Stand Ignores Consequences To Socialists' Struggles If Hitler Wins
'Leftist' War Stand Ignores Consequences To Socialists' Struggles If Hitler Wins By SIDNEY HOOK By SIDNEY HOOK HAT attitude should Socialists take towards the present war? This question, so...
...In ether words, those who object to the course here advocated must prove either that a victory of the capitalist democracies over Hitler would be worse than a victory by Hitler, a; Coughlinites and Stalinites maintain...
...a victor}' of the democracies over Hitler implies that they, too, are convinced that no reasonable equation can be drawn between Nazi Germany and democratic England...
...For it means that insofar as the efforts of socialists could have any effect on the war, they would contribute to producing a condition in which the very activity for socialism would be a capital offence...
...cr that, in the event of war, there exists a third feasible alternative for the labor and socialist movements which will forests.il the advent cf Fascism and prevent their own destruction, as many claim but none has so much as described...
...Y . Times, July 20th...
...It is prepared to defend the U.S...
...To maintain that if democratic capitalist America is attacked or invaded by Fascist Germany, socialists should declare that their chief enemy lies within their own country, is in effect to help Fascist Germany to victory...
...Although the exact nature of the French state at present is hard to determine, its Fascist orientation is obvious...
...Let us assume it does...
...This is true even if those who hold this view cautiously forbear from drawing its logical conclusion viz., civil war against the democratic capitalist government while it is at war with a Fascist power...
...According to this view, socialists should support no war of capitalist democracy against Fascism, no war of defense against actual invasion by Hitler and the Gestapo, and no military appropriation—"not a ceftt, not a gun, not a man"—for defense...
...This difference is illustrated in the respective positions, at least on paper, of the Stalinists and Trotskyists on the one hand, and of the Socialist Party and many independent socialists on the other, to the principled question, "Under what circumstances, if any, would socialist support of the U.S...
...I am of the firm opinion that the capitalist democracies, and with them the international labor and socialist movement, can best be helped by the U.S...
...For if it were true, and constituted a sufficient reason to refuse to support war, then even a war of defense' againsf Nazi -invasion would be impermissable...
...For defeatism and sabotage can have the same effects...
...This meets with the objection that war must necessarily follow...
...For as the quotation truly says, Fascism spares none...
...A Stat...
...The-first group answers none, the second, only in case of actual invasion...
...They must adopt a kind of Clemenceau policy against the appeascrs, the fifth columnists, and the inefficient wherever they are found...
...a war against Fascism necessarily leads to totalitarianism,'iJtett ar defensive" war by capitalist democratic America against Nazi invasion would also, lead to the same result Yet Norman Thomas and the Socialist Party are not opposed to military measures against Fascism in the event of actual invasion.* The more consistent position is intransigeant revolutionary defeatism—more consistent but still inconsistent with its other premises, besides being politically, insane...
...Why should socialists oppose a war against Hitlerism— if it be true that a triumphant Fascism spells the end of all socialist, labor and liberal parties while a defeated Fascism means a possible socialist revolution in Germany and Italy, arid a continuation of progressive movements elsewhere...
...total political, social, economic and racial destruction which lie lit the wake of every Axis victory...
...We may be able to shut the window as we drive the beast out through the door...
...which has stood as godfather...
...But this is an argument which those who take the position of the Socialist Party cannot employ...
...14 and li'4C...
...This is like telling a man wrestling with an assassin that he should fight not merely for...
...and despite that disagreement...
...This position could only be consistently held if it were believed that there W no appreciable difference between Hitler and Roosevelt—the modern - version of the theory of social-fascism...
...Germans in Tokyo are boasting that the Service Through Diligence is patterned after German examples, "such as the Strength Through Joy...
...If the old trade unions continue to resist, the Government, however, will not take the physical means of extermination practiced by the Nazis...
...But if they were in control of the government, there would be no war...
...These analopies arc exact insofar as the labor and socialist movement, in fighting Fascism, is literally fighting for a chance to live, for a Lrbenszrii in which it can at least put forth one mere effort to realize its positive ideals...
...I expect, as a socialist, to vote for Thomas...
...A discussion which pursues any one of these or similar tacks is worthless...
...The nub of the matter is this...
...My disagreement with their position on aid tc the Allies is the only disagreement I have with the Socialist Party and its standard bearer...
...It is asserted that such...
...It may be granted, then, that risks accompany every course of action...
...Democratic capitalism, if it is preserved against the onslaughts of Fascism, gives at least the possibility of organized activity in behalf of socialism...
...but a defeat of the capitalist democracies with the same likelihood will convert them into vassal Fascist states...
...I am acquainted with no compelling reasons to believe this...
...Socialists in the present period car...
...A defeat of Hitler in all likelihood will lead to a socialist revolution in the Fascist countries...
...Socialists have made many tragic errors in the past...
...outcome is much less than that a triumphant Hitlerism will result in totalitarianism everywhere...
...But to carry on a civil war against the government trying to stop Hitler, is to insure Hitler's victory...
...After all, we have been sending some supplies, less than Germany and Italy sent Franco, and no matter how much we send, Hitler will probably wajt until he defeats England before taking the U.S...
...These analogies are inexact insofar as it i« possible for a determined labor movement to aid in the fight against Fascism in such a way that, in the event of victory, its position will be strengthened Who can deny that if England defeats Hitler, British labor will be far better situated to continue its struggle for democracy and socialism than French labor today...
...Those who deny that we need fear an attack by a victorious Hitler must argue either that this is outside of his intent or beyond his power...
...In the meantime they disorganize the straggle against Fascism by asserting that since the democrats who sett arrayed against Fascism may be the fascists of tomorrow, that therefore there is no difference between them today...
...it be answered by any or all of the foUowihg three fallacious procedures, adopted by many writers in the l?lt?f~and-socialist press who insist that this is not our war even as the consequences of war break over their heads...
...That many capitalists do not desire to fight Hitler but to imitate him is, of course, obvious...
...The first may lead to totalitarianism...
...For the struggle against Hitler has the approval cf the overwhelming majority of the American people...
...Then membership in the "Service Through Diligence" will be made compulsory for all workers, as will be the payment of a regular contribution out of each salary...
...experiences which make life worth living...
...Concerning his power to undertake such an attack, if Britain is annihilated, military experts are in disagreement...
...The moral is not to contribute to that defeat by laming the only practical alternative to capitulation...
...The issue then reduces itself to questions of f a c t Does Hitler challenge democratic American institutions such as they are...
...Certainly, democrats may become fascists after they are defeated...
...The political irresponsibility of such a position strikes one in the eyes when it is combined with the admission that there is a considerable political and cultural difference between democratic capitalist America and Fascism...
...That is one of the differences between IS...
...Concerning his intent there can be no legitimate doubt i f we examine the Nazi record, program and, not least, its philosophy...
...One would expect, therefore, that at the very least their program would call for shipment of military and economic supplies to the beleaguered opponents of Fascism...
...It is modeled after the Strength Through Joy state labor organizations headed by Dr...
...it may be able to advance the cause of genuine social democracy if it is courageous and intelligent...
...A policy, fraught with the same fateful consequences as the policies of appeasement and absolute neutrality, that can be rend\red untenable by one or two technical inventions, is stamped with the hallmark of political unrealism...
...Only one serious argument has ever'been advanced against socialist support of a war against Fascism...
...All this while Hitler standi at the door and obligingly waits for the civil war to be over before striking...
...But in a war between the democracies and Hitlerism, there are only two practical courses of action open for socialists: either to devote their energies to heir the democracies win, or to oppose them and thus weaken their struggle against Fascism...
...This was the position of the Socialist Party when the Loyalist government of Spain, capitalist but democratic, was defending itself against Franco, Mussolini and Hitler...
...The expressed preference of the spokesmen of the Socialist Party for...
...The first is opposed to support of any democratic capitalist state at any time (except in a colonial' w a r ) ; the second wonld support a democratic capitalist state only in time of invasion by a totalitarian power...
...trace union, Service Through Diligence, has been launched by the Kortove government...
...Despite rigid government control Tokyo union leaders refused...
...For every historical action is marked by uncertainty...
...But it scoffs at the idea that the U.S...
...It is immaterial who sends supplies, the government or a private agency, so long as they are sent...
...It is undeniable, however, that a policy of organized and officially sanctioned help to Britain may result in war...
...And, second, because it does have sincere' supporters, Leninists who are neither- followers of Stalin nor of Trotsky, as well as the valiant group of former Trotskyists, organized in the Workers Party...
...The workers will be reduced to starvation wages and slave conditions of labor...
...Much can he learned from the tactics of the English Labor Farty without following it blindly...
...No one in his senses can argue that Hitler's defeat will mean the same...
...These covered the seamen and the agricultural workers while the A l l - Japan Trade Union Federation bargained for industrial and commercial employees...
...The existence of the war against Hitler is the fact which sets.the problem for socialists...
...It is important therefore that independent labor action as well as organizational integrity be preserved...
...An imperial order—inspired by German agents operating in Tokyo—commanded the Federation, the Seamen's League, largest Jap labor organization, the Harbor Workers Union, and the Agricultural Workers to disband the beginning of August...
...or like censuring a sick man, t a k i ng desperate measures to check a pernicious disease, because his efforts are so negative, so devoid of the positive, vita...
...First, because it is a possible position...
...What he said then, is just as true today...
...At the same time its spokesmen declare that their sympathies lie with" the democratic powers and that they prefer the victory of the latter to the victory of Hitler...
...Jap Unions Fight Nazi Labor Set- Up Ordered by Konoye Although little known to the irestern world Japan until recently had' the Orient's largest jad strongest unions...
...In the accompanying article, Sidney Hook analysis the arguments of these groups...
...Nor, significantly enough, does it criticize their brother Socialist Parties abroad for taking a precisely opposite course...
...its terror is absolute...
...For if he is not stopped, trade-unions and workers' organizations everywhere will be destroyed...
...or unless he can produce a feasible alternative which represents "the least evil" in a critical situation...
...overthrowing capitalist democracy and Hitler at once, a prospect so far-fetched as tc tax the pious faith even of dialectical materialists...
...The case of France is highly instructive here...
...And so it is with, the American left wing isolationists...
...Proletarian Shibboleths N E CASUALTY of the second World War is the intellectual prestige of the honestly isolationist groups on the somewhat ill-defined Left Many of these exist in the form of minute political parties whose "insurrectionist" shibboleths are drawn from archaic traditions, .or a hyper-thyroid and garrulous revolutionism so sectarian it has nothing on the worst features of a suicide pact These s i n c e r e anti-war groups—ranging all the way from sliver DeLeonist groups to the Trotskyist and Social-' ist parties — have failed to adjust themselves to the new concept of...
...So may socialists...
...the victory of Fascism, however, carries with it the practical certainty of the total liquidation of the labor and socialist movement throughout the world...
...professional patrioteers, and gcverment officials as well as among crganiztftkins controlled by Germany and F.ussia...
...The second is to substitute the question: "Who is responsible for the present war...
...The labor and socialist movement not only can help save whatever democratic rights we still have...
...But the probability cf such an...
...The greatest cf these was their support, in most countries, of the first world war, out cf which has arisen a state cf affairs quite different from what existed in 1?14...
...Why discuss this position, then...
...So long as they hold the fantastic view that Russia is a workers' state—which makes them allies of the Stalinists;—they will not raise the Leninist slogan, "Turn the imperialist war into a civil war" in any country which happens to be ranged on the same side as Russia in any war...
...XX/ILL a war against Fascism convert capitalist democracies into " totalitarian cultures...
...By this reasoning even the Bolsheviks were socialpatriots for supporting Kerensky against Kornilov...
...This is what Hitler's victory means...
...The first procedure is to assume that what ' was a valid position in respect to the first world war-must still be valid in respect to-this one...
...a war will bring totalitarianism to the, democracies which engage in it...
...It is obvious that if...
...At the insistence of German representatives, who revealed that the Seamen, and other trace unionists in a position to do sr», were cooperating with the democracies, the Imperial Government has put additional pressure on the labor outfits...
...fruitfully concern themselves with the problem cf hew to render the most effective support to the democracies in their struggle against Fascism and at the same time strengthen the prestige of their ideas...
...Just as obvious is it that this is a direct result of defeat at the hands of Hitler...
...But it is clear that granted his intent, the question of Hitler's power to attack America, after he has consolidated the resources of Europe, depends solely upon technical and technological considerations which may change with startling rapidity...
...life but for the good lrfe...
...The third is to wax eloquent about the dangers of one course of action and to ignore the greater dangers of any practical alternative...
...The ority possibility of "revolutionary action" will take the form of Thorez' proposal to organize a Republic of French Workers under German control and with Hitler's permission...
...To use the fear that capitalists will not fight Hitler as a reason for refusing to support a war actually being waged against him makes no sense...
...Some assert that capitalist governments will not fight Hitler which, if true, makes the existence of the present war a mystery...
...When we ask them what assurance they have that their revolution will net degenerate into a totalitarian one-party state on the Stalir.ist-Tretskyist model, they can only answer in terms of probabilities and hopes...
...to ward off the menace of Fascism, not by a declaration of war against Germany and Italy but by mobilizing our resources to send immediate military and economic aid to England...
...And some are sura to be found among big business men...
...This question, so momentous for the, future of the socialist movement, cannot be decided by sacred texts or slogans...
...They follow the line of James Maxton and his colleagues in the Independent Labor Party of Great Britain, who, while Stukas scream and spit exploding flame upon next door's children, assail the "boargesjs -d—eracy" of the Labor-dominated British cabinet ". With complete annihilation champing only 22 miles across the Channel, with the trade, unions of 11,000,000 formerly organized Workers run by storm troopers, with the socialist movements— and this editorial writer doesn't permit himself the thought of the scores of thousand of trapped exiled leaders in France — literally "ground out in dung — filled concentration camps, the I.L.P., enjoying full English democracy, assails Downing Street and crie» fer a "Socialist peace" with Germany...
...Suffice it to say that those who believe that we should aid Britain ward off Hitler's attack can with confidence take the issue to the country, as well as the issues that may grow out of that support...
...Negroes will be pushed still further into the slums and swamps of oppression and misery where they have lived so long...
...Here ?9 a characteristic passage from a declaration by t h e Workers Party, "This Is Not Our War...
...The possibility cannot be gainsaid...
...TTHE official position of the Socialist Party is not as extreme as * the one criticized in the foregoing section...
...O I N C E R E exponents of the policy of' no support to capitalist ^ democracies in any struggle against Fascist aggression are well aware of what the victory of Hitler means...
...To the question, then, why take a chance of letting in through the window what we drive out by the door, socialists must respond that, if it comes to war, this is the only chance we have...
...The probability cf the latter is so great as to amount to practical certainty...
...the second will lead to totalitarianism...
...Rather should such a fear lead us to a drive for the successful conclusion of the war against Fascism, in the course of which Hitler's allies can be exposed...
...or that it is six of one and half a dozen cf the other, as Trotskyites assert, and which was true—inj 1914...
...Those who maintain that this is merely another imperialist war and that socialists must oppose both sides equally, fall into two groups...
...The Jap government will plan to starve out its real unions by legislating out of existence their right to collect dues...
...It is a chance that we can improve upon if a shrewd and courageous labor movement takes the lead in the struggle...
...We will defeat Hitler, cries the revolutionary Mad Hatter, only by first defeating the enemy within our own country, those who are ready to fight Fascism although not yet ready to fight for socialism...
...This is admitted, albeit unwittingly, even by those sectarian romanticists who counterpose a socialist revolution as a method cf defeating Hitler at a moment when the democracies are engaged in a life and death struggle with him...
...Stop Hitler' is the cry...
...But such a belief is demonstrably fals?^somucri so that none'biff-the Stalinists have • ever advanced it, and these only at the command of their master...
...But this theme is too large for a brief discussion...
...All workers are eligible for membership...
...History is replete with illustration* where the consequences cf failing to take a proper position create new conditions which make the old position untenable...
...I t also opposes any economic or military aid to the democracies at war with Fascism, as steps necessarily leading to intervention...
...Nor can...
...and to conclude from the fact of equal responsibility that the consequences of the victory of either side will be the same...
...This will bolster a war-weakened treasury...
...Fundamentally, the issue is first one of available alternatives and only then one cf relative probabilities...
...This on the assumption that they could ever succeed ir...
...government in a war be justified...
...Sometimes socialists are taken to task for defending capitalist democracy against Fascism on the ground that they thereby commit themselves to a negative and defensive role inntead of rallying the masses in a positive struggle for socialism...
...TPHE second question as to the effects of a Hitler victory upon the status of the international labor and socialist movement is even more easily answered...
...D E F O R E beginning the discussion, I want to make clear that I *"* am under no illusions that the official Stalinist or Trotskyist parties sincerely hold the first position...
...From this it follows that in principlt the Socialist Party is neither pacifist nor defeatist, and that under some circumstances it will espouse the same position which the European socialist movement has taken to the present war...
...Only individuals who know that there is not the remotest possibility of their exercizing a responsible influence on the labor movement (or Stalinazis carrying out instructions) can permit themselves the luxury of such ideas...
...government, even under a," capitalist regime, in the event of an invasion by a totalitarian power...
...Unfortunately, the platform written by the leaders of the Socialist Party shows not the slightest recognition of the implications cf their own preferences...
...Trotskyists are Stalinists manques...
...Would his victory be more disastrous to the hopes and prospects of the international labor and socialist movement than the victory of the democratic powers...
...Hitler must be stopped, for Fascism spares none" (my italics...
...To hope to destroy Fascism after helping it to overcome democratic governments is the same kind of criminal absurdity of which the Stalinists were guilty when they argued: "Nach Hitler kommen wir...
...O U T this is the policy cf "the lesser e v i l ! " So it is' Why should any one with common sense object tc a lesser evil unless he can show that what is called "the lesser evil" is cither just as bad as, or worse than, "the greater evil...
...The Stalinists are creatures of the Kremlin's foreign office and, depending upon their orders, will over night swing from an insurrectionary position to the maddest chauvinism, particularly if Hitler marches against Stalin...
...for the question: "What are the consequences to democracy and socialism of victory by one side or the other...
...They, have failed to adapt their hatred of war to the contemDorary need for defense of the democratic political vehicle in which they are still permitted to fight for ^-"socialist state" and for "proletarian democracy...
...Many months ago, Professor Oscar Lange, brilliant socialist economist and political analyst, predicted what the outcome of Hitler's victory would be upon the domestic regimes of the defeated democracies...
...Ley in Germany...
...Jews will be driven once more into the ghettos and will have to scrub streets -.under the whips of stormtroopers...
...is in any such* danger...
Vol. 23 • August 1940 • No. 35
