I AM NOT A FELLOW TRAVELER. . .'

...There has seldom been an autobiography throwing so little direct light on the persona), development of the author...

...The reasons are of a tactical nature: had "socialist" fronts in Eastern Europe not been liquidated prematurely, many "left Socialists" from Western Europe would have participated in the efforts of Pietro Nenni, Oscar Lange and Mr...

...interpretation in terms of "world revolution" would shatter the credulity of another group of dupes who are so important for Communist fronts because they give them good capitalist money...

...Del Vayo differs from the Kremlin...

...The alliance of Vatican reaction and American capitalism stands out as the most significant political development of the post-war period...

...Del Vayo's opinion, only helps fascists and reactionaries...

...And then, there follows one short paragraph of criticism of the Russian occupation policy...

...One simple fact, we learn on p. 353, that "Russia wants peace...

...If he iiuoted what she said about civil liberties and freedom of criticism and opposition, ha would hare shocked his fellow-travelish readers...

...del Vayo, to "create an instrument of action which would regroup all Socialists of the Left...

...Because there is an abyss between democratic socialism and totalitarian communism...

...HE ALSO THINKS, nay, he is sure, if an election were to be held in the Soviet Union, with American voting machines and no pressure on the electorate, that Stalin would receive an overwhelming majority...

...ALL THESE EXAMPLES illustrate well the intellectual and moral niveau of the book...

...All right, let us look at the record...

...As it is, her criticism is happily reduced to the question of "form...

...In Del Vayo's opinion, he was "the most fanatic yet one of the greatest monarchs of Spain" and "famed as a despot, he was almost a liberal monarch when it came to affairs of government...

...Of course, ottcourse...

...Del Vayo says: "President Truman's dramatic announcement that Russia had the atomic bomb served to strengthen my confidence...

...And Mr...

...And the fact that some directors of industry and officers of the Red Army were of working-class origin...

...From this point of view, it is only logical when Mr...

...As always in such cases, there arises the question: how is it that a man, who started as a sincere liberal and socialist has become, to use Rosa Luxemburg's words, a pathetic official apologist of a ruling class...

...Del Vayo established the first contacts with high officials of the Soviet government within twenty-four hours alter his arrival, a fact he rightfully stresses because many foreign diplomats and journalists have to wait for such contacts for months...

...For instance, there were "Army excesses in the first days of occupation" (meaning wholesale rape of German women) but the soldiers "have been ruthlessly disciplined" and "the situation improved favorably...

...And this respect for power and strength is by no means reserved only for "progressive" powers and personalities...

...By . no means...

...She was not in agreement with the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat conceived by the Russians and objected to the division of land among the peasants...

...It did not occur to him—to a man who thinks he is a Marxist—that the social character of people changes when their function in production and state changes...

...Del Vayo's attitude toward the Spanish king Philip II, the instigator of the Holy Inquisition, the hangman of the Netherlands, one of the most cruel fanatics and sadists who ever occupied a throne...

...It did not occur to Mr...

...This respect evidently demands that she be silenced in her grave...

...Bui nothing is said about the bloody suppression of the Barcelona anarchists and left Marxists by the same Negrin, about the same Russian blackmail which led to the overthrow of the Socialist government of Largo Caballero, about the assassination pf the POUM leader Andre Nin and other Socialists in Spain by the GPU...

...Del Vayo that by this criterion we have "an essentially proletarian system" in the United Staates too...

...It did not occur to him to read the tremendous literature analyzing social developments and class stratifications in Soviet society...

...It did not occur to him to ask, instead of his high-ranking official friends, the starving and enslaved workers in factories and labor camps...

...In one word, if I may say, he was as progressive, liberal and humane as Ivan the Terrible, although not quite as much as Joseph Stalin.,., I dare say that this kind of fascination by cruel and powerful fanatics is a significant trait in the psychological set-up of many proSoviet "liberals...

...homage is rendered to the great socialist leader—and the teeth of her criticism are pulled out...

...So it is better not to interpret at all, and "explain" Soviet chauvinism and Drang nach Osten und Westen by the assertion that "Russian men and women have risen in their own estimation...

...The Russians also "made use of Nazi technicians and even officials" but "they kept them under rigid control...

...there are some clues and they all point one way: it is" power that fascinates the author above all...

...But why...

...Interpretation in terms of power politics would tend to repell bona fide left-wing followers who don't like imperialism...

...As to the Spanish civil war, the book contains a weak apology for the surreptitious delivery of Spanish gold to Russia, a still weaker apology for Juan Negrin, who is supposed to be as little fellow-travelish as the author himself, and plenty of gossip about Del Vayo's opponent, Indalecio Prieto...

...By the way, the GPU is hardly mentioned througout the book, [ft seems to go badly with Del Vayo's highly advertised idealism.J But Rosa Luxemburg, whom Del Vayo knew personally and adored in hisyoung years, wrote a penetrating criticism of the Bolshevik mistakes, and it is very interesting to see how Del Vayo treats it...

...So why do we have world conflict and tension...

...As there is nothing more about this vigorous disagreement in that place, we turn to the chapter on the author's post-war visit in Germany...

...He fascinated me by his theatrical effects and his fighting spirit,"—these are Del Vayo's own words...

...Proof...

...Also, Mr...

...In other words, the work of the would-be Fierlingers of the West was spoiled because the masks of the eastern Fierlingers were dropped too early...

...One cannot believe that it was as simple as that...

...he ifllMltrtitl "llilUj Lfl flBM*with the Communists against fascists and reactionaries...

...to interpret it from the point of revolutionary ideology would be equally misleading...

...True enough, except that Del Vayo forgets to elaborate on the disagreement about the "form...

...Even the inevitable inner conflict about religion—which played a big role in the development of young men of his generation and must have been especially important in a descendant of a strongly Catholic Spanish aristocratic family—is glossed over rather frivolously with a story about how young Del Vayo left the church services to look for the birds' nests in the fields...

...So Del Vayo can safely say that "many of her criticisms were proved correct" but, of course, their utilization in the anti-Stalinist controversy showed a lack of respect for her memory...

...But most revealing is Mr...

...THE BOOK, being an autobiography of a journalist and politician who lived and took part in the political struggles of many countries, covers pretty well the political history of the last forty years...

...To interpret Russian policy exclusively in terms of power politics is sure to lead to false conclusions...

...He knows better: the athletes don't come from ambassadorial offices, so the regime is essentially proletarian...

...That's easy: 'The danger of a new war lay in two factors: the armament race initiated and financed by the United States, and the capitalist world's fear of being beaten in economic competition by the socialist world...

...he "refuses to join the anti-Russian chorus, which has sometimes been noisier ana more unsupporteMe on the Left than on the Right...

...He disagrees — vigorously, he says — with "certain aspects" of Russian policy, especially "the policy of permitting Germany to rise and recover from the war more rapidly than its victims...

...He also knows that there is no such thing as Soviet imperialism...

...But only people "lacking in scruples and a respect for truth" might "And material with which to build up Del Vayo as a fellow traveler...

...Could it be that they are not quite so sure...

...It starts with the statement that in the Russian zone, there are also "many things" to be criticized...

...Fortunately enough, "the peoples of the world would go to war against the Soviet Union very much against their wishes—or they would not go at all" and left-wing revolts (in Western Europe) "may take place in 1950 or 1955 or at some other date but they will take place with mathematical certainty...

...Still...

...But some names and some facts are rather conspicuous by their absence, Del Vayo is profoundly interested in the development of the Russian revolution...

...He never treated with his adversaries but attacked them with all his strength...

...So we read in his autobiographical book...

...Del Vayor did not see any contradiction between the promise of higher democracy and the practice of police terror and concentration camps...

...he also forgets to explain why Soviet rulers dont try this wonderful ejfperlment...

...And it took him not too much longer -to establish "the important fact that has too often been forgotten: that after twenty-nine years the Soviet system has conserved its essentially proletarian character...

...So he says when he defends himself against the accusation of being a fellow traveler...

...Although the book is an autobiography, there is little material about Del Vayo's inner development...

...The rulers of Russia must suppress and exploit a dozen European and Asiatic nations because Russians "have risen in their own estimation...

...If he sometimes looks like one and the accusers seem to have a case, it is only because they judge him by "surface appearances" Of course, he "has^.sympathies for the Russian revolution...

...but a serious treatment of the break with religion was probably considered bad public relations...

...He combined "simplicity with sobriety, pride without vanity, stoicism and insensibility to pain...

...Russia was strong—that was the fundamental conclusion I drew from my visit to Moscow," he writes on p. 351...

...You find there stories about many famous men, and judgments about many political developments of that period...

...Oh no, God forbid...

...Visiting Russia after the war, Mr...

...Reviewed by PETER MEYER ALVAREZ DEL VAYO does not consider himself a fellow-traveler...

...There we find many pages of violent criticism of the American occupation policy which, in Mr...

...Del Vayo does'not approve of the merger of "left-wing socialist parties" with the Communists in the satellite countries...

...But there is also nothing about any inner conflicts or soul-searchings in the times of the Moscow trials, of the Hitler-Stalin pact, and of other crucial developments which demanded a moral and political decision...

...The annual sport parade in which boys and girls who took part came from the working class...

...Del Vayo has great respect for the conservative Spanish politician Antonio Maura: "He wanted the revolution from above, the complete transformation of the archaic Spanish state into a modern structure...

...Thus, of the 17 lines of the paragraph criticizing the Russian policy, 12 lines were devoted to excuses for some "minor faults" which had to be reluctantly admitted, and Mr...

...BUT WE FEEL the duty to report also on the points where Mr...

...but the greatest post-revolutionary social upheaval the forced collectivization, is neither described nor analyzed, and the Moscow trials and purges, which shattered the conscience of every socialist in the world, simply don't exist for our author...

...Del Vayo can "say without hesitation" that he "did not find in the Russian zone the constant contradictions between theory and practice, between what was promised and what was accomplished, that characterized the British and American administration...

...He somehow forgets to give reasons for this belief...