Politics for Power

...For while both Russia and Britsin require stability, the partition of Europe can only b* conducted, in th* last analysis...

...Churchill's words, "less apd less of an ideological war...

...But this, neither Britain nor Russia can permit, for the Unity of Europe means the excluaion of Britain and Russia from the continent, it means the initiation of the factories from the Kaar to Bohemia aa an inner industrial turntable with the Balkans and the North as the raw materials and agrarian centers...

...It is a revolutionary nationalism •hwilar to the Grau San Martin movement, described by Boris Sapii in The New l.eailei two weeks ago...

...The implications of the Three Power Peace have not, I feel, been fully realized by those labor and liberal forces which split on the issue of the war...

...Under a lighter hand, this could give ima to an opera bouffe, with each of the Three nimbly springing from one . bargaining position to another, trading with one hand and grabbing with the other...

...The Big Powers understand this, I feel, and thus are in a hurry to establish a "peace before victory," to freeze the mold of the world according to this existing ratios...

...As Forrest Davie, the White House unofficial pipeline to the public, put it in his recent Saturday Evening Post pieces, the new world order would be on the model of the Pan-American Union, with no permanent capital, a small staff and the Rig Three to maintain order...

...It arises where there is a threat of outside .Political and economic domination...

...The second is more important, and it gives meaning to tbe report this week that Russia will print the Czech invasion currency to be used by the Benes government . It lends credence too to the report in tbe British magazine Nineteenth Century and After, the organ of England's ' geo-politicians, that a "supplementary agreement" exists to the Soviet-Czech mutual assistance treaty...

...The emphasis was mine, for Churchill has introduced here a startling notion in our diplomacy . For tbe past two decades we have sought to put a ceiling over and limit armaments...

...For the temporary unity of the Big Three is aimed against Europe and the stsbility ef their worlds depends upon their blocking the "unity ef Europe...

...Over ell the other side of the globe, another series of perplexing problems remains to be solved...

...The people are beginning to combine in strange new ways...

...Whether it will Ire any more successful than Munich remains to be seen...

...it being made today and it being made piecemeal...

...Munich was an attempt to resolve certain basic an-tsgonisms that were irresolvable...

...Yet both are "practical men" and concrete proposals advanced by the two reveal the simple scheme of a Three Power World...

...In tkit tote, the decition to create Three Worldt meant in the long-run the destruction of Europe at an entity and the decline of Europe at a political fatter in world again...

...i—Will We grant the rising national aspirations ef the colonial peoples...

...One year later there Was war...

...4—Can we develop the backward induatrial areas of th* world (e.g., China and India) without ei-pMtatisw ef their peoples...

...And as Professor Fredrick Pollock points out, "on a amall scale, Allied policy has already been faced with this dilemma: recently, requests for hsdly needed textile machinery for factories in southern Italy and new equipment for Sicilian sulphur mines were turned down...

...Europe is to b. partitioned...

...not by promoting "revolutions" within the Big countries but by disrupting the economic plans of the countries...

...Our present Conservative path of blocking genuine social change and thus spawning grotesque and deformed revolutions can only result in making future history, in Ortega y Casset's bitter phrase, a "notorious, constant struggle between paralytics and epileptics...

...What this adds up to, pure and simple, is a combination of Three "insiders" divying up the world, prorated to their armed strength...

...The war is creating new social forms and social forces the shape of Which we can only perceive dimly...

...As far Germany, there have been hosts of rumors regaining probable partitions or tripartite occupation for ten years or so, but all of this is conducted on tub iota levels...

...and Czech railways, motor roads and airlines are to be constructed to meet tbe economic needs of both countries...

...1943...

...one on monetary problems will open July 1. Conversations are under way on the questions of oil, aviation, and shipping...

...It comes when Big Power* forces play "native politics" even in Europe...

...General de Gaulle, on the other hsnd, insists on the restoration of France as a sovereign world power...

...He adamantly claims full righto to all French possessions...

...But germinating within the plans for stsbility is a curious dialectic—the inner antagonisms of the peace...

...The talk, talk, talk of politics tends to obscure eco-¦oesie realities...

...We are on French soil, bat no one, let alone the Frenchmen, know what political and administrative steps we intend taking in France...

...She can go along by buying machine tools and whole factories in America and by absorbing the industriea of eastern Europe...

...The peace is being made at a series of international conferences on decisive economic problems...

...The economic base for a unified Europe haa already been established on the continent by the forcible seizures snd absorption of European industriea by the Gertnaaa...

...Czech industries, mines, sources of hydraulic energy are to be nationalized...

...The statement ia instructive for th* implicit and **ay acceptance of this new phrase "paramount in their regions" which replaces the older "spheres of influence," To discuss this as the same old game of power politics misses the vital historical significance of the decisions...

...France is perhaps the prime example...

...That it why the pro re...

...The pattern of organization here is no accident but deliberately created to ¦ become the bone structure of Three Power domination...

...Wc have laid down the slogan of "unconditional surrender," but we hsven't promulgated the conditions which will be imposed...

...The last seventy-five years saw a series of attempts to unify the continent with Germany and France alternately making the attempt...

...He is unwilling to sea the whole French Empire restored intact, without guarantees that will protect U. S. security...

...Real-polxtik is essentially a cynical amoralism which derides the hopes aad aspirations of peoples and settles "fundamental" ¦joeationa of power and antagonisms in the light of historical and economic interests...

...As for the more far-reaching and vexing issues outlined above, the only conclusion open is that there has seen no diplomacy or that general "understandings" have been reached...

...Supplementary to thia, will world trade he rondacted in terms of "free trade" as proposed by Cetdell Hull aad the "expansionist" group of Aster iran capitalists, or will trsde be organized areend th* "sterling bloc" principle recently eaanciated by the London Econamitt, or some similar device which aaaarea debtor nations seme share in the world marketsT 2—What Facile and Atlantic bases does America want as pert ef the aew conception of "national lifelines'' and military security...

...Hers is a comprehensive plan to make Czechoslovakia a "colony'' of Russia...

...Bat too many persons in the world have lost their capacity for that sort of mirth...

...Roosevelt's blueprint for the coming peace follows the same pattern...

...Th* unyielding altitude of General de Gaulle regarding these possessions is aald to be the real explanation for Mr...

...it '* a French Socialist and liberal criticism of the Gaullist movement—but that these criticisms should come seriously from the State Department is ridiculous...

...In his grab-bag speech to Commons on May 25, tbe British war lehder stated: ". . . for this purpose of preventing wars there must be a controlling council . . . comprising the greatest states which emerge victorious from this war, who will be obligated to keep within certain minimum standards of armaments for the purpose of preserving peace...

...The Soviet Union has her eye, tee, oa the technical resources and the skilled labor ef Germany...

...Each has a well-defined sens* of national interests, and of power politics...

...There are three reasons for the latter decision: A rehabilitated Europe, with modern machinery, is a nightmare for American and British business in their competition for world''market...

...He has »*ld definitely that French Dakar cannot be left under a control that will threaten the approaches to this hemisphere...

...as matters proceed favorably however the w*r becomes, in Mr...

...In Europe, Brimm and Russia are the protagonists, with the United States able to play the role of Dutch uncle...

...Will Eerepe remain free and be allowed to organise as an economic unit and/or political federation without the domination of Russia or ¦rkahjT There have been no answers, in fact the "secret diplomacy" of this war provides more mysteries than all th* intrigues of 1914-18...

...Men do not willingly gle in defense of economic interests, so during the early period of the war official pronouncements are in terms Of ideologies...

...The President remembers that, when the United States wss hardest pressed by German submarines, the French islsnd •f Martinique served as a hostile dagger aimed at the vitals of our Caribbean defenses...

...the formal unity of war hides the underlying antagonisms of the peace...

...Russia cannot continue her course of the last twenty years of bleeding her people white to build heavy capital accumulation...

...the advantage accruing to us as the only greet power ia the hemisphere...

...l—Will the U. S. permit Britsin to regain her expert trade, without which her economy is 4eea»*d...

...In Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin and Fraaklln D. Roosevelt the political world has found the most com- < plete and hard shell "Marxists" since the time of Met-ternich and Talleyrand...

...But no such attempts have been successful in western history...

...The one rase where we have received aurrender, that of Badogiio in Italy, the peaple still do not know the guarantees that were given to him in Sept...

...Besides the inner antagonisms within the three, there are a host of outer forces that constantly wash at the walls...

...One of the derivative* ef this situation is that there la, been talk, talk, and more talk about the war and the posttrar world and few concrete facta about the aim* and plsn* of Hi* victorious powers...

...In the Orient, United States and Russian interests dash, with Britain on the periphery...

...public conferences will be held after the issues are thrashed out privately...

...Teheran was attempt to bring the Three Big Powers together...

...Tbe balance of power meant that no country could be strong enough to jeopardize England's position and challenge her control of the Mediterannean, her lifeline to Empire...

...Here we have created the necessary condition for survival...

...Roosevelt and his sdvisors do not forget that the French, without a fight, turned over to Japan the big naval base at Saigon, Indo-China, thereby enabling Japan to outflank Singapore and to cut V. S. access to rubber and tin...

...will the Russians recognise it...

...The inner dynamic of Nazism inevitably precipitated war...

...By this I do not mean only the traditional colonial nationalism of India or the Arabic world, but revolutionary nationalisms in Europe as Well...

...the aimultaneow*}-uevkBiaiion of war against the Asia by our weaker neighbors...

...GauHisra is not socialism or even fascism in the sense w» have known it It is a revolutionary nationalism *hose economic structure may be collectivist but whose political content is an aggressive national pride...

...The President is thinking also of Madagascar, «•» Caledonia, French Guinea, the islsnds of Miquelc.ii and St...

...Polities for Power IT iMjr b* on« of th* major paradox** of our genera-ti«a that World War 1 was an impcrialiat war, ^void of reveJuUosssry aim*, ret with revolutionary hy products, while World War II began ai an ideological war with social-revolutionary pretension* and aaded in the vise of a Three Power*' Peace...

...These moves hsve given rise to counter-actions in Britain...

...No responsible Allied statesman has yet attempted to raise for public discussion, or provide a straightforward answer to, the key questions of postwar world organisation...

...This is a Meea«arr corollary of the fact that the war i* being fought along the Unas of real pcAttik...

...A realignment must take place on the real issue of the day: whether we will have an imperialist rediviaion of the world or a unified world system without exploitation of any peoples...

...We have had conferences on food, labor, education, relief and rehabilitation...

...The case of da Gaulle is an instructive case in point: Allied leaders have found it possible to embrace the Fascist Franco in Spain and the Communist Tito in Yugoslavia, a Darlan in North Africa and a Badogiio m Italy, yet in the case of de Gaulle, we find the State Department spokesmen sdvsncing ideological reasons ** oppose the French Genersl...

...the Czechoslovak and Russian State Banks arete work in conjunction with one another...

...Her leaders chose military aggression...

...We can take the step of making Europe self-sufficient within her own msrket, using German industry as the base, or we can pulverise Europe and divide her re-aourcep among the other powers...

...The decision, however, has been made...

...But it is more than Europe that is at stake...

...Th* alternative to this, and th* second reason, is the creation of a soclslixed Europe, utilising th* heavy industries to build a consumption economy, but this is just as bad, for it violates th* third reason: Russia and Britain need to absorb the resources of Europe for their own economic survival...

...m te, in part, an offshoot, I believe, of the statist trends within every country...

...But the outcome of- a war difert from iti purpoie...

...To adopt a passivle or isolationist position would only have given Hitler a chance to consolidate Europe his way...

...Roosevelt's reluctance to give him complete recognition...

...This war marks the permanent dec-line of Germany and France as important political powers...

...And thst is true of each of the Big Three leaders...

...Czech war industries sre to work for the Russian and Czechoslovak Si still, wsr production is to be standardized so that B will conform with that of Russia...

...In his statement to the presa on June 16 his major point is the creation of a dominant World Council with permanent seats for the Big Powers...

...German industry after the lait war was being crushed in the inexorable vise of "export or die...

...There is little doubt thst this may be true...

...Archibald McLeish, a weather-vane of the liberals, warned in pathetic angriness several weeks ago that the peace we are making "is a peace of gold, a peace of oil...

...Wrote the United State* .Yens: ' Mr...

...China has been carved out as an American preserve...

...It is a phoenix nationalism arising out of defeat and humiliation...

...Britain and Russia desperately need a period of liability to repsir their war wrecked economies—that is the key to Teheran...

...it is analogous to the Colonels' revolt in Argentina, the Majors' revolt in Bolivia, and the vision of Cliiang-Kai ahek in China'l Dettiny...

...Churchill has refused to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire...

...Chuichill's idea of a Metlernich bloc in Europe will fall before Russia and the United States will not be the drag anchor for the British Empire...

...But whether the case is the first *r the second, the people do not know...

...The social upheavals of the future, if I may venture a guess, will come from a wave of rero/ntionarji nationalisms...

...Britain watched carefully on the sidelines, keeping a neat "balance of power" between the contending forces...

...J—Will the small nations—and the defeated natiea* have the right of self-determination, or will their territories be partitioned in terms of oaM pre quo bargaining...

...Czechoslovak earrency is to be stabilised in conformity with the lessisn...

...And that it why the war time it no longir valid or meaningful in political anaJyiit...

...One passsge in the Davis articles provides an interesting exposition of Roosevelt's realistic great-power theory: "Far more significantly, the President conducted at Teheran a seminar for Stalin's benefit in the good neighbor policy...

...Pierre...

...What makes infinitely more sense about the U. S. attitude to de Gaulle in report in the {'wiled State* fftnt on "Our Postwar Stoke in the World's Strategic Outposts," which was reprinted by the csutious Rendu:* D*0**t in its June issue...

...while Roosevelt, with South America and the Orient already under control, ia seeking to avoid Wilson's mistake in Europe recently described by William C. Bullitt in Lift, of not using his tremendous financial and military power soon enough, when they were the decisive factors...

...Modern technical efficiency and a low wage policy would undei -aell the other two...

...He eltad ia' proof...

...H is futile to think that a world can lie stabilized on tile basis of a Big Three power division...

...By the creation of favorable social and economic conditions within the continent we can weaken the forces that lead to war...

...BoTH Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt have paid lip-service to the idea of a unified world...

...The President recommendec' the policy for strong powers paramount is their regions, such a* the United States in the new world and the Soviet Union, presumptively in Eastern and Northern Bo rope...

...This writer was "pro-wai," a position which I feel was correct...

...Most of European society has been atomized and fragmented...

...Social revolution* on the continent would provide a aeries of shocks thst th* Big Powers would not be able to bear...

...The first is a short-run proposition for Russia does not want to become dependent on the west and in its debt...

...And with that decline there ia paved the way for the emergence of a unified Europe operating as a homogenous economic entity...

...We are told thst -o» Gaulle has a dictatorial complex, that he is undemocratic...

...The Smuts-Halifax speeches calling for closer collaboration by England with the western European countries is a direct answer to the Russian steps...

...With these, she is the master of the continent...

...Stalin has stoked out Russia'a claim to Western Europe...

...This supplementary treaty is as follows: tbe Czechoslovak economic system is to b* brought in line with the Russian...

...at the expense of Britain...

...Churchill is proposing that we increase the world's armaments by putting a floor under production...