EXPERT LIGHT ON THE RUSSIAN ENIGMA

...Dallin's analysis, and no one has a right to acclaim the Russian experiment as a desirable fulfillment of socialist hopes, unless he can specifically refute what Mr...

...Reviewed by Norman Thomas THERE is one outstanding fact about the chaotic world which will emerge from the war...

...Certainly Mr...

...Dallin does not prove it...

...Here he does not indulge in assertions but presents evidence...

...MR...

...The conditions in the work camps are horrible...

...DALLIN examines the new upper classes, (that is, the top officials, the bureaucracy, and the intellectuals) , the working class, the peasantry, forced labor, the Communist Party, the Red Army and the N.K.V.D...

...If he is right at this point an American government, friendly but firm, may have a bargaining power for decency greater than our State Department has heretofore seemed to believe...

...Stalin also seems to be making some progress in identifying the Russian national enemies with the class enemies of the workers so that he can "liquidate" Bulgarians, Rumanians," Poles, and possibly Germans, whom he hates or fears, as the class enemies of the workers regardless of the real facts...

...He seems to accept the notion that the means by which Lenin came to power determined absolutely the course that Stalin has followed...

...I do not want to over-emphasize these points of criticism, so invaluable is the analysis of Russian conditions which Mr...

...He gives ground for some hope that after the war is over, these developing social classes in Russia, including the Red Army, can force a progressive limitation of the power of the N.K.V.D...

...Dallin makes objectively and in most cases with supporting evidence...

...I do not think that any commentator in the press or on the radio has a right to advise us on our relations with Russia without taking account of Mr...

...Neither does he prove his bald assertion that Stalin was justified in his deal with Hitler...

...Men may differ in their estimate of many things in Russia and of the time element requisite for its achievement of supreme power, but if anything in the future is certain it is that the U.S.S.R...

...The number of managers, white collar workers, or bureaucrats, call them what you will, necessary to the conduct of Russian industries completely controlled by the political state is appalling, and gives food for thought to all of us who want to conquer unemployment and poverty by social planning and still keep lib-ertv...

...John Scott and others have presented a far more powerful case that Stalin's policy towards Hitler was not forced by an absolute necessity of protecting Russia, but rather by his hope that his western enemies would destroy one another to his great advantage...

...Dallin tells are almost comparable to the horrors we have been hearing from Germany...

...The picture of dictatorship and economic inequality in Russia is very grim...

...The latter have to carry passports and to belong to unions which are servants of the state...

...There are few matters of recent history more important than to determine how far Lenin's theory of the road to power was responsible for all that has happened in Russia and how far it has been degraded under Stalin...

...He has developed an effective technique for progress towards it through temporary "democratic" coalition governments in neighboring states with Communists in chief positions like the Ministries of the Interior...

...The author concludes by accepting a dark picture of the immediate future in Russia...

...There are probably as many forced workers in the U.S.S.R...

...Nevertheless, the author, to my mind, mars the first section of this book by certain theological assumptions that he does not prove...

...The British Empire will still be a force to be reckoned with, but it can not match the power of our own country or of the U.S.S.R...

...Dallin presents in the last 8 chapters of his book...

...Hence the great value of David Dallin's book, The Real Soviet Russia...

...Dallin has told us about the actual situation in the U.S.S.R...

...But," says he, "the course of the war, the price of victory, and the postwar situation in Russia constitute the prologue to great internal changes, greater changes than some are inclined to expect...

...FIRST the author humorously discusses the nonsense talked about the U.S.S.R., then he examines Stalin's policy as it really is and shows how well he has been able to reconcile Russian nationalism with a continuing belief in Communism and eventually in a world revolution...

...While the Russian system has accomplished a great deal in industrializing the country and preparing for war, it has not conquered poverty or raised the standard of living or proved itself highly efficient by western standards...

...But I do not accept Dallin's dictum that "the Moscow formula, 'Stalin is the Lenin of today,' is quite correct...

...It established a quasi alliance rather than "neutrality," by which term the author describes it...

...But of that the San Francisco Conference and the probable nature of the peace terms give small hope in the near future...

...Because the argument of the book and its importance have been played down or distorted by so many reviewers it is the more worth while to summarize an argument which Mr...

...Dallin believes that Russian losses in the war have been even greater than most writers have told us and that the postwar population in the next few decades will be less than they predict...

...Ideally the question should be largely solved by the rise of a new form of world organization in which the power politics maneuvering of strong nations is not the controlling force...

...Any other imperial power will exercise dominion more or less on sufferance...

...as the mightiest nation in the world and that its power will be enhanced by its other army, the International Communist movement...

...The monstrous horror of future war between our 2 great nations will not be averted by temporary alliance based on mutual appeasement of rival imperialisms...

...as those who are at least nominally free...

...Probably Stalin's ultimate notion of world organization is a world-wide union of Soviet Republics...

...the all pervasive secret police...

...The great majority of prisoners who are political are in many camps under the rule of criminals who are considered redeemable...

...A word of praise is due Joseph Shaplen for his excellent translation...

...Two powers will be incomparably stronger than any of the others— one is tempted to say than all the others combined...

...and eventually a modification of the dictatorship...

...I think it is false to say that Stalin "betrayed" Leninism, and I am doubtful whether if Trotsky had won over Stalin Russian history would have been very much different...

...is destined ultimately to supplant the U.S.A...

...It is therefore of the first importance not only to ourselves but to the whole world and its peace what the future relations of the United States and Soviet Russia are to be...

...Dallin writes with the more authority because in an earlier book, Russia and Postwar Europe, he so accurately forecast what is happening...

...Some of the stories Mr...

...We must begin by facing facts...