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From New Militant, Vol. I No. 52, 28 December 1935, p. 3.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’ Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
James W. Gerard, former U.S. Ambassador to the Kaiser’s Germany, wants to introduce the terroristic methods of German Fascism into America. This agent of the capitalist ruling class sees the class struggle assuming more open, more sharpened form here too in no distant future. Hence lie takes the opportunity in an address of “welcome” to some newly naturalized citizens in Jersey City to inject the proper note of terrorism against the militants of the working class into his speech. He warns that “those who will not conform to the institutions of this country, who seek to overthrow our government and substitute some foreign communism, will soon be hunted like mad dogs in our streets.” What the upholder of American capitalism means by “conforming” is obvious. He means that the employed workers shall submit to the wise guidance of the bosses when they deem it necessary to cut wages and lengthen hours; that they shall not attempt to better their lot by daring to organize into unions and to strike against the oppressors and exploiters. He means that the eleven million unemployed shall starve patiently on the miserable dole given in a spirit of Christian Rooseveltian charity, without making too much of an organized nuisance of themselves to disturb the parasitic upper crust of capitalist society. Gerard would exterminate the Marxian vanguard, those “mad dogs” who might spread the virus of revolt among the other “dogs,” the working and toiling masses. Gerard’s fears, needless to say, arise not because of any foreign importation of communism into America from abroad, but because the same struggle for power by the proletariat is inherent wherever the capitalist system exists, in the United States as well as in Europe. And when the struggle becomes clear to the workers, they will know how to defend themselves against the “dog hunters,” how to answer the Fascist white terror of the Gerards. They will set up their own institutions and their own standards of conformity.
The ex-Foreign Secretary of Great Britain has been sacrificed by the reactionary Baldwin government to prolong the life of the present cabinet. Hoare failed to act with that proper savoir faire, that hypocritical ease in saying pleasant nothings while committing evil deeds that is the recognized hallmark of bourgeois diplomacy. The great crime of Hoare is to have revealed in brutal nakedness just what the Baldwin government meant all along.. The elections having passed, Hoare felt it unnecessary to pretend any further that British imperialism has the slightest interest in the Ethiopians or in anything but the power and the pocketbooks of English capitalists. The resignation of the Foreign Secretary does not mean in any sense that the intentions of Baldwin have changed or that the actual proposals to give Italy half of Ethiopia were “wrong.” All it means is that the necessary amount of diplomacy, i.e., of sham and fraud, will have to be used to cloak these real designs and to cloud them in secrecy. The game will be played with greater astuteness by the left-over Edens and Chamberlains as a result of the fall of Hoare. He is symbolic of the power of British cant and hypocrisy whose roots extend deeply into the labor movement as well as into bourgeois circles. Only those who really represent the deepest interests of the masses are not interested in fooling the masses. Only, that is to say, the Marxist vanguard.
The visit of important officials of the Soviet government of Outer Mongolia to Moscow is but a sign of the ominous nature of the situation in the Far East. However extended the theater of war, when it breaks out, between Japan and the Soviet Union, Outer Mongolia will be an important part of it. The Japanese army has long declared its intention of strangling the Soviet maritime provinces by cutting off their communication with Russia and the Ural region. This could be best accomplished by means of a campaign through Outer Mongolia to cut the Transsiberian Railroad. In self-defense against the Japanese bandits the Soviet government has been laying tracks parallel to those of the Transsiberian, but further north. In addition railroad lines are being laid by both Japan and the Soviets to be ready to pour troops into the Mongolian sector. The seizure of North China by the Japanese robbers has the two-fold aim of laying the basis for the further gobbling up of China, and for more extensive preparations for invading Siberia. War in the Far East seems only a matter of the briefest time. If Japan invades Outer Mongolia – and this seeing to be the intention of the Japanese army – the incident will be provided that will set the world ablaze in a war of intervention against the Soviet Union. European repercussions would not be long in following. All the moves made by England with respect to Italy have as their dark background the next stage of developments, with Hitler Germany preparing to strike at the Ukraine. England would like to see a solid front of Germany, France, Italy and herself against the Soviet Union, with Hitler acting as the spearhead of conquest and reaction. Workers must be on the alert to aid in the defense of the Soviet Union.
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Last updated: 4 February 2018