THE WAR DRUMS BEAT AGAIN
THE WAR DRUMS BEAT AGAIN Coolidge's Big Navy Address Reveals New Armaments Race rrf[E campaign of stupidities waged by the upper da— leaders of American polities has scarcely come to an mu\ when...
...p5 encouraging thing is that they are not content to lie down under the Hoover landslide...
...tell them that it is here, en the map, functioning daily* and that its name it the Socialist Party...
...Thomas can get away for only a few days...
...You Ban-combatants hi the rear will be wiped off by poison gat attacks," he said...
...If England, France or Japan is the next "enemy** our propagandists will again provide the hate with the war...
...Liberals must learn to overcome their dislike for the bread and butter job of organizing...
...The job will be as easy when we have reached another crisis as it was before and we should do what we can to avoid reaching that crisis...
...A dispatch from New Orleans declares that the Metal Trades Department of the American Federation of Labor has endorsed the fifteen-cruiser bill for the navy and a naval program that will be a "more effective arm of the national defense...
...Requests for Socialist speakers from quarters which had previously been closed to us are coming daily...
...The fact is that the hading Powers each talk in terms of an equality of armaments while each endeavors to tip the balance of is—' in its own favor...
...The bill is supported on the ground that it conscripts human material and property at the same time...
...Just why the members of this organization should be considered authorities on this question and other questions related to peace and war we do not know...
...It is obvious that whole cities In the next war may be scenes of rotting corpses and if a few escape the death vapors pestilence will be certain to take them...
...all are sauna the fighting aones...
...It is the easiest thing in die world...
...For every one who has the interest of his party at heart, here is the long awaited opportunity...
...With the invention of the air¦lane and poison gas that distinction has- been wiped sat A baby in its cradle is now legitimate prey of the world's War Lords...
...Efforts to obtain an agreement ky which poison gas shall be limited in its use to the acted aones of fighting have also failed...
...Having worn a uniform, they appear to think that the civilian who questions their attitude and views is a seditionist...
...And insistent mail calls him back to his desk at 70 Fifth Avenue, New York, and up at Socialist National Campaign Headquarters...
...It does not...
...In the ease of Japan the propagandists would stress the racial and monarchist aspects of that nation and the cunt* met sy over Japanese immigration in California* In the case of France, the violation of the Monroe Doctrine by invading Mexico and making Maximillian Emperor...
...There are omissions in some documents that were published and there are cases of alteration of originals in order to support the official version...
...Norman Thomas said last week to a reporter from The New Leader: , "If these disillusioned Liberals and Progressives who want a genuine,opposition party of workers with hand and brain are willing to come along with us in the gruelling work of organization that is ahead, we welcome them...
...the invalid, the cripple and the blind...
...Most of the vocal propagandists are professional men, business men and politicians who as a rule know little about international problems and are incapable of taking a long range view of policies...
...They are not Socialists who are asking this question...
...That is how it was done in the hist war...
...y are those who call themselves Progressives and Liberals **d who threw away their votes for Al Smith on November Hp last...
...The Socialist Party offers a shelter...
...Tie prospect of wholesale execution of innocent and tfslna people behind the lines of actual fighting has acesme so frightful that a chemist has declared that, when war comes, he prefers to be at the front...
...For centuries a clear distinction ass been made between the combatant and non-combatant forces in war...
...The work of Professor Fay shows that the diplomats of each nation were as guilty as any others...
...The same thing is trae of gas masks...
...In no ease did any Power attempt to tell the truth...
...Meantime chemists are experimenting with more (badly gases and explosives and there is feverish comtuition in this field...
...the old and the Tseng...
...Our war propagandists provided the hate as well as the war...
...ansa* world standard* of defense require us to have stare cruisers...
...A writer in the New York Times declares that there is a gas to force the wearer to sneeze which, upon removal of the mask, is followed by a discharge of a lethal gas that will "effectively kill off the non-combatae...
...Join it and work for a warless and peaceful world...
...Each published only so much as would make out a case for itself...
...The civilian pspnlstion, men, women and children...
...There is a competition to obtain the most saadly gas, each power endeavoring to keep its own •arret formula from leaking out...
...The Slackest reactionaries will forge to the front...
...In a few short months that mood may have passed...
...The editing was inspired for the same purpose...
...It may be said that the United States because of its association with the Allies will never go to war with England, France or Japan while Germany is incapable of waging war.- The answer is that not one man or woman in a thousand in this country hated the German people until we were told to hate them...
...Experiments are being made to perfect a mask that will resist the most powerful gas aad to make a gas that will penetrate any mask that ¦ made...
...Waiting till the votes were cast President Coolidge chose Armistice Day to say to Europe: "It is obvious that, eliminatfmJ M compe...
...They are •j&pletely disillusioned about any help from that quarter...
...HAS any friend of yours asked you since election, "What ¦re you Socialists doing about organizing a great party opposition to the Republicans...
...Workers in these trades may gel more employment through an expanded naval program so a temporary advantage of this sort induces them to support armament rivalry and endanger the peace of the world...
...Mr we shamble blindly on, led by the blind and the atopic, destroy the treasures of civilization and ourselves into the bargain merely because the dominant parties and their leaders chose to disregard the fearful abyss that yawns ahead...
...A hail of death may rain (ram the skies on villages, towns, dues and the connIryakls in the war that is gestatfng...
...If every member of the party will take it upon himself to follow up those in his community who really want something new in American political life, who are sick and disgusted with the tactics of both old parties, if he will regard himself as being in the thick of a campaign fully as important and significant as the one just closed, then indeed we can eon' solidate the glorious gains we have made...
...This material deceived many honest writers in the respective countries while the dishonest propagandists expanded the material of their own nations into hymns of hate against the "enemy...
...Each of the warring governments published official docnmenta in defense of its course in going to war...
...Perhaps some metal workers who support this policy may live to learn that) m wife, a child or m mother died of poison gas in m future world war...
...When they ask you, "How about a new political party...
...They must be willing to be bored if necessary...
...THE WAR DRUMS BEAT AGAIN Coolidge's Big Navy Address Reveals New Armaments Race rrf[E campaign of stupidities waged by the upper da— leaders of American polities has scarcely come to an mu\ when an issue of supreme importance which they had ignored emerged* We are again facing a race with death...
...They are writing to Thomas, to Maurer, to Hillquit and "trger because they have discovered that nowhere else outPM* the Socialist Party is there any hope whatsoever for that militant party of opposition to reaction which they now so pdently desire...
...In so doing the statesmen of Be world are toying with dynamite and risking an exslssfcm that will desolate the peoples of the world...
...It was never truer than right now...
...Now they are ready for experiment, for trying something different...
...It is a time-worn adage that the time to strike is when the iron is hot...
...In our own country the American Legion is employing aH its influence to have Congress enact a universal conscription measure...
...It carefully provides ¦for- she profits of she coipoiatlone but complete conscription of the masses as soldiers...
...Relations between the Great Powers no more promise peace than did the decade that ended with the World War...
...Meantime the consuming flames of war will rage over vast areas while back of the lines the helpless men, women, and children will flee before clouds of poison* vapor and die like flies...
...Moreover, it becomes evident that in any war we cannot know the facts because the facts are in the hands of those who dare not tell the whole truth or place all evidence before the masses who are called to serve in the trenches...
...Socialist education and organization were never more important than now...
...In the case of England, our two wars with that country, the burning of the eapitol at Washington in the second war, British use of the Indians in these wars, the Venezuela dispute and the long conUowy over impress merit of American snainnii Those who blunder into war with another nation can always find plenty of material for the manufacture of "hymns of hate" against the "enemy.** Once we are in, any independent thinking will become a crime* The thinkers will go to jaiL The mob spirit will be encouraged...
...They must learn as we have learned that in America today the thing that counts is not so much undirected enthusiasm and flaming zeal for a cause as ORGANIZATION...
...Moreover, there are gases now made that will hunt •at refugees in basements and any other underground refuge which terrorised civilians may seek...
...That this is the most hideous thing that could overtake humanity is evident...
...Why not anticipate what will happen and work avert H rather than wait tJH It arrives and wen ? powerless to do anything but submit and die...
...If they will take their coats off and get down to the job of organising us their own communities, they can help us buUdup in the country the party that will take the place of the now defunct Democrats* as the representative of militant and constructive opposition to those who stand for the status quo...
...The British and French materials are not complete as there have been no revolutions in France and England as there were in Central Europe, but much that was concealed by diplomats of these nations have been supplemented by the documents dragged out of the secret archives of the other powers...
...Is this field of poison gas there is also an insane asm petition...
...Time is important and votes may yet be changed into hammer strokes against this disaster...
...Bat more American cruisers insures the very competition which we wish to avoid...
...Censorship, a sedition act, and then complete control of all news agencies by the propagandists and the Job is accomplished...
...They had not reckoned with this amazing tide of newly awakened interest in Socialism...
...They are college students and faculty members, young *orkingmen and farmers, doctors, lawyers and newspaper¦ten, school-teachers and librarians—in fact, a whole cross.•action of America 1928...
...I * * * They have at last pierced the fraud of the Democratic P**y which, we Socialists so long ago recognised...
...In other words, we not only face poison gas but also poison diplomacy...
...The desk of Norman Thomas is heaped ¦ifn with letters these days from all parts of the country and front all sorts of people, asking almost piteously, "Where do **g© from here...
...The rise of this attitude of mind in the United States simply shows that we have inherited from the old Junker Germany a militarist spirit which dragged that nation into the pit...
...The result of Professor Fay's studies shows that not one of the governments at war published all the important documents...
...An earthquake or the eruption of a volcano is a pleasant diversion compared with what the masters of the world's governments are preparing for mankind...
...Now people's interests are aroused in matters political...
...If you haven't been asked some such question, you *"* an exception...
...Fourteen years have bean spent in a searching study of the published documents by this scholar and his conclusions are of the utmost importance to those who appreciate the dangers...
...The Labor and Socialist movement in all other countries strives to support every effort to keep the peace and unless we do likewise we are false to the labor movement itself...
...As though to show the folly of modern wars and the downright stupidity and even deception of the diplomats who have oar lives hi their hands, Professor Sid* ney Q. Fsy'a twa volumes on the origins of the world war have become available...
...Its program is a negative on the policies which are dragging the nations into another terrible conflict...
...But even among trade unions one may find the advocates of a policy that invites death for millions in a war with deadly poison gas...
...And it is much the same with the other candidates...
...Everyone of them is busy mailing out, in response to inquiries, information concerning the organization of the Socialist Party, its aims and its purposes...
...Over and over again he emphasized that word organization, organization in wards and election districts, organization of communities and neighbors...
...There is a fight still left in them There were some who thought that after election Thomas and the other candidates would go off on a well earned vacation and drop for a while all political activity...
...HOW ABOUT THAT NEW POLITICAL PARTY...
Vol. 7 • November 1928 • No. 49
