TRENDS: Ideas in action; events as they reflect social tendencies
OAK, LISTON M.
TRENDS: Ideas in action; events as they reflect social tendencies By Liston M. Oak Forecast of Trends in 1945 political and-economic tendencies of 194* recorded here will, I think, be continued...
...The negotiations between the Poliah Government-in-Exile in London and Stalin were ahadow-boxing...
...It fully recognizes that without th* execution of this treaty in letter and spirit the peace of th* world will always be in jeopardy...
...The Russian Government meanwhile haa tponaored the Lublin Committee and is likely to give it full diplomatic and that th* Polish Government in London has commanded the allegiance of the majority of Poles...
...After clearing the whole territory of German occupation and after evacuation of all foreign armed force* from Poland, th* Polish people will be able, in free and democratic elections, to chose a political system for their country and to elect • gov* ernment in accordance with their own will...
...This party tti formed by the Comintern as late as the winter of 1941-1942 to replace the Polish Communist Party, which the Comintern dissolved In 1987...
...m The difference between the big powers will grow wider...
...the appeasement of such totalitariana as Franco and Stalin, the attempt to restore the statua quo ante bellum, the ultimately futile effort to prevent drastic social reform, will be continued...
...events as they reflect social tendencies By Liston M. Oak Forecast of Trends in 1945 political and-economic tendencies of 194* recorded here will, I think, be continued and deepened in the coining year...
...But these movea can achieve nothing more than to persuade Mikolajczyk and pei haps one or two other leadera to enter the Lublin Cabinet...
...Administration of the territories cleared of German occupation is in the hands of s party which never played an important part in Polish political life, namely of th* Polish Workers Party, acting under various nap...
...Stalin began the new year by transforming the Lublin Committee into a government, with Boleslaw Berut aa Acting Preaident and Edoard OsubkaMorawski as Premier...
...In the early part of 1944 this party appointed the so-called National Council, composed of 80 persona whose names have never been made public...
...The Polish Government protests emphatically against this attempt against the sovereign rights of the Polish nstion, made by the Lublin Committee, which haa illegally assumed the title of Provisional Government...
...The Polish nation will never recognise any authority or any totalitarian forms Imposed on Polish national territory and v ill not cease to stand for the genuine independence of Poland...
...It is a contemptible lie to denounce them as Fascists...
...All leaders and all more prominent politicisns who remained in the country are carrying on the struggle against the Germans as th* Horn* Council of Ministers and Council of National Unity, on which all principal political parties are represented...
...he went through the motions only because Churchill iiiHisted...
...Th* territory under the administration of th* Committee is in a elate of permanent ferment and economic and adaslnistratlv* rhaoa, due...
...four of the Workers (Communist) Party, and two of the "Democratic" Party...
...By following the political pattern which they perfected in Spain during the civil war, and which enabled them to transform a tiny, insignificant Communist Party into the moat powerful in the Loyalist Government by the time Franco won, the Stalinists in the liberated area of Poland have gained aacendancy, aa they have likewise in the KAM EI.AS in Greece...
...It'a an unbeatable formula...
...No one pretends that the solution of this problem is easy, but if no honorable solution ia found, fresh agony ia in store for stricken Poland and good relations between, the great powers' can hardly fail to be affected, tTSe . "The Polish Government in I-s—don^e*th* right to protest against th* action Ukeri 4pjasss«W*-lt should strive to put its own house in order so that the British Government may once mor* use its influence with Moscow to secure a wiser and more magnanimous Soviet attitude to Poland...
...Last July this anonymous council assumed the prerogatives of a parliamentary body, appointing as Its executive organ the so-called Committee of National Liberation...
...the support of monarchists and other reactionaries...
...The eyils flowing from the Teheran agreement to divide Europe into sphere* of influence, with concommitant power polities, which have brought betrayal to Poland and civil war to Greece, will lead to further clashes between Russian and British imperialism, with the United States and France playing one power against the other...
...Th* labor movement of Britain has a special interest in this subject For twenty years, before th* Ancle-Soviet treaty was signed, it earnestly advocated such an alliance...
...It if now admitted by all responaible commentators that events in Greece and Poland have shown that there ia no real political harmony or unity between the dis-United Nations...
...We cannot with honor abdicate from these responsibilities...
...The European war will end, in my judgment, in 1945, but will not bring peaceful democratic progress...
...This Government 1* recognised as the legal representative of the Polish Republic by the United Nations, by countries associated In this war and by neutral states...
...They remained at their posts after the epic struggle of the two months • rising of the whole people of Warsaw, and they still continue to discharge their dutiee in dose collaboration with the Polish Government...
...united mont with polygamists against polygamy7 At the recent International Labor Conferee**, Raphael Abramovitch tall a political fable: Thar* waa once a King of Slam who bad a tares* of m beaatios frost 16 to M. All the wtrWs governments were willing te sign treaties with tfciSlamese potentate...
...Polish peasants, workers and intellectuals are carrying on the struggle against the German invader at home and abroad...
...They have acquired fame only by being Stalin's Quislings, and they hold only the ahadow of power, not its substance...
...Thcso are splinter groups from the genuine Socialist, Peasant, and Democratic tics of the Polish Underground which support the Government-in-Exile, They are parties "made to order" by the Communist*, to give their united front the appearance of mass support...
...of the Committee of National Liberation in Lublin...
...Tm announcement from Lublin that the Polish National Committee has declared itself to be the 'first Provisional Government of liberated, democratic Poland' does not come as a surprise...
...j liere in monogamy ask the old...
...The Cabinet has five members of the "Socialist" Party...
...Rut would* the peoples who ha...
...A consequence of all these prognosticated develop menu abroad, particularly the abandonment of the Atlantic Charter, will be a revival of isolationism at home, and a growing threat of reaction In every field, above all a concerted drive against labor...
...We have a vital interest in securing a just settlement for them and the brave people they lead...
...The International Federation of Trade Unions will be discarded and a new labor international launched with the Soviet "trade 4x*lons" and the Latin-American CTAL unions under Lomhardo Toledano, and the C^mmuajsU InU^Amerlcan CIO in alliance with H ill - Peasant parties will be further split on the united tint and other questions, and a new "Socialist" intertional started Under powerful Communist Influence if not leadership...
...I earnestly hope events will prove me wrong on every one of these predictions...
...five of the "Peasant" Party...
...Therefor* we plead once more with all parties con cerned for a renewed attempt to reach a solution which will not leave Poland again a breeding ground for turmoil in Europe and tribulation among he.i unhappy people...
...Th* direction of this struggle rests in the hands of th* Polish Government in Exile...
...Yet we also have deep obligations to th* Polish Socialist...
...With all the resource* at their command, including GPU terror, they will eventually be able, of course, to recruit mass memlierahlp for all these parties, until the' time come* to liquidate them and establish a one-party dictatorship...
...gentleman of Siaf to became honorary preaident of ft League AgaindJ Polygamy 7 All the world's governments are today > • i sign treaties of non-aggression with Itn- It why believe that the chief of totalitarian 6 • -n...
...three can achieve unity in suppressing it, th« price of Russian collaboration being abject capitulation and appeasement...
...Under the existing conditions the Polish nation has no means to express its will and to manifest its disapproval of the new act of lawlessness on the part of the Lublin Committee which now declared Itself to be the Provisional Government...
...People's Front" governments and other united front maneuvers of the Communists will be successful, steadily weakening the really democratic forces including the democratic Sociallata, the liberals, and the free trade unions...
...The Atlantic Charter ia like a Christina* tree on New iear*, nay - omrarneti in tne glutei...
...None of the leaders who now constitute a government were active in the prewar leadership of the Polish Socialist and Peasant parties...
...nlam can bo the foremost champion of democrat...
...Dumbarton Oaks, Bretton Woods and Chicago In reach lag enduring democratic solutions of world problems and guaranteeing collaboration and collective security...
...Russia will continue to expand her sphere of Influence and consolidate totalitarian Communist control in central and eaatern Europe and Germany and march toward ultimate hegemony of the European continent...
...But I greatly fear that 1946 will not be a "happy New Year," although it will probable be better than 1946...
...Toward Civil War In Poland . . . • When the Lublin Committee of National Liberation waa first organised in July, 1944, this column predicted that Moscow would ultimately make it the puppet government of Poland...
...But our sombre expectations do not make this fact any more agreeable...
...The British snd American Governments still recognize the Polish Government in London and, however much they may deplore the recent changes in that government and the failure to reach a common program which Mikolajczyk could have taken back to Moscow, it will hardly bo possible for them decently to withdraw recognition...
...A "hard" peace such aa VanaltUrt and Rex Stout and the Communists advocate will drive Germany Into the arma of Stalin...
...Devastated Europe will suffer colossal hunger and epidemics of typhus and other diseases •uch as UNNHA cannot cope with, and economic and political chaos so widespread that no stable democratic governments can be firmly established Britiah and American foreign policies will not change basically...
...They were mediocritiea, hardly known to the people...
...By taking advantage of thU and by cancelling all democratic liberties, th* Lublin Committee ia introducing a system of posies administration together with legal standards and educational principle* totally alien te the tradition, of Poland and of Western Ear ope...
...political and social organizations sure only instrument...
...This will give British diplomacy a face-saving formula, but it will not avert the impending civil war in Poland aa the Red Army advances—a struggle that will be promptly drowned in blood...
...Washington and London will go through the gesture of seeking some sort of conciliation between the Lublin puppet regime «hd the Polish Government-in-Exile and the Underground which it leads...
...There will be civil war and an abortive social revolution in more than one European country, unless the big...
...There will be farther betrayals of the principles of the Atlantic Charter, including the recognition of the Lublin "Provisional Government" of Poland with possible face-saving compromises, and a Carthaginian peace for Germany...
...Stalin never l.ad the slightest intention of arriving at a compromise...
...to the incompetence *f th* administration itself and te the absolute lack of confidence on the part of the general public In Ito decrees...
...Tata latest, long-expected move on Europe's chessboard of power politica haa deepened the enmity between the players, Churchill and Stalin, with Roosevelt in the role of kibitzer...
...Why should the democratic force* enter a raited front with the totalitarian feres* 7 British Labor and the Lublin Committee Excerpt a from an editorial in the Britiah Labor Party organ, the London "Daily Herald," January t, 1»45...
...poland will not surrender Tk* following atatemtnt too* issued by tko Polish Government, January 1, 1946, on the establishment of a 10-eaUed Provisional Government of Poland by tht Poliak Committee of National Liberation...
...IN the part* of Poland cleared of German ocenmatioi there exists neither freedom of speech, MsoriatM«Vj>i assembly...
...On the contrary, they have a better title to speak in the name of Poland that the Committee of Lublin...
...On the other hand, civil authorities of the Underground Polish Republic and Polish Underground Army, which for more than five years carried on the struggle againat the German Invader, have been dissolved in the area of the activities of the committee, while members of administration, officers and other ranks are being imprisoned, disarmed and deported, often together with their families...
...The men and women who are represented on the committee have hitherto been unknown to the Polish public...
...And so 1946 begins with another betrayal of the "Four Freedoms" which are our purported war aims...
...The pros, radio and all officially recognize...
...Administration of Polish territories by th* Committee cam* into being only a* th* rosnlt *f th* military sitestioa...
...The international conference in the coming year will not be more successful than those held at Moscow, Teheran, Cairo/ Casablanca, Quebec...
Vol. 28 • January 1945 • No. 1
