Some Notes and Information on Anarchist Opposition to War
Translations and Summaries by Charlatan Stew
CHARLATAN STEW, Seattle, U.S.A., 1995
I. Coming to Grips With the War
Coming to Grips With the War: the ratification of the Russo- German Pact was followed immediately by war; the silence imposed by the ideologists (Communist and Nazi) has allowed the cannons to speak by Federation Anarchiste Romande, Geneva, 1939
TO THE WORKERS: NO STATE, NO WAR
Perhaps the tragic hour could have been postponed, but there was no hope that it could have been avoided. In these days of feverish and agonizing anticipation, in the face of the frightful menace, the peoples of all nations remain irresolute Their passivity has its roots in the consolidation of human societies into powerful and ever-more militarized states. The pretext for this consolidation has been the necessity of repressing violent individuals and groups. But what it has actually achieved is the most monstrous organization of violence and the compulsory education of everyone in destruction and murder. And that is one of the basic reasons why anarchists want to deprive the state of the armed force it perpetually uses to threaten all those subject to its power. Because citizens have renounced their most sacred rights, and are used by states as instruments of life and death, the world’s fate is in the hands of a few governments. The state machinery has been perfected to such a point that it is nearly impossible for an individual to escape.
OUR UTOPIA
Peace will only prevail through an anarchist organization of societies, one that no longer fosters fighting between groups for goals of enslavement and usurpation. Only when people seek within their own societies to practice mutual aid and promote well-being and culture for everyone, when groups compete with each other only to attain more improvements in civilization– only then will there be peace.
This is criticized as utopian. But, accepting this criticism implies despairing of ever realizing a truly human life, and forces people to remain attached to the worst forms of degradation and death.
EVERYONE IS GUILTY
Workers: In saying that everyone is guilty, we’re not speaking about the responsibility of the masters of all states. They have had the power to stop the massacres in China, Ethiopia and Spain, and have permitted them to proceed. What we are talking about is the guilt of those who have consented to be the instruments of such horror and infamy. In no country have we seen a broad movement of popular solidarity with all the victims, not even in those subject to Nazi military invasion.
At first, the British and French plutocrats were reassured by the triumphs of Mussolini and Hitler. But today they feel threatened, now that the two dictators are openly calling for armed imperialist expansion. The French and British governments are not opposed to the clearly warlike ideology; as a matter of fact, they themselves have been pursuing the most insane kind of arms race.
BOLSHEVISM AND FASCISM
The Russian Revolution changed proletarian thinking in a short period of time, demonstrating the possibility of insurrection and emancipation. Fascism, which also claims to be revolutionary, has restored the shaken faith of the bourgeoisie in its own strength and durability. Concessions to labor are finished, along with the kind of liberal perspective that supported labor’s demands. In brief, Bolshevism gave confidence to the proletariat; Fascism gave it to the bourgeoisie.
The bourgeoisie has supported Fascism and Nazism in order to avoid anything that might cause it to suffer a resounding defeat or might even lead to a mass movement going beyond the capitalist order. That is why shocking and unprecedented concessions were made to Mussolini and Hitler, in stark contrast to the harsh limitations imposed on the preceding Italian and German governments.
THE THREAT OF WAR USED AS BLACKMAIL
The great powers’ granting of such concessions led the Fascist- Axis powers to use the threat of war as blackmail. But this could not be prolonged indefinitely without the eventual outbreak of war. As Norman Angell has shown, Great Britain, in a departure from its traditional practice, pursued a policy which increased the strength and influence of its potential enemies. Moreover, class interest was placed above national, or even imperial interest. Patriotism in the strictest sense was left to the have-nots; the possessors of wealth were no longer interested in promoting it.
…ANOTHER ABSOLUTISM
Meanwhile, some people persisted in their faith in the Russian state–and even the worst disappointments didn’t really cure them of it. Their faith wasn’t shaken, even though the Bolshevik state rulers allied their government with the Mussolini regime from its very beginning; even when, the day after Matteoti’s assassination, the Russian ambassador threw a banquet for the Duce; even though, during the Italian war against Ethiopia, the U.S.S.R. was the main provider of grains and fuel to the Fascists; even when the U.S.S.R. gave the same kind of assistance to the Italian government during the Spanish civil war (while the Italian government aided the Spanish Fascists). Mussolini proclaimed in the Italian Chamber of Deputies that the Bolsheviks were magnificent teachers; and the Italian shipyards have continued to provide warships to the U.S.S.R.
As for Germany, the Communists there joined with the Nazis (before the latter’s rise to power in 1933) more than once to fight against democracy. And once Hitler came to power, the Rapallo Treaty between the German and Soviet governments was maintained. Commercial agreements were expanded, and not one diplomatic incident marred the relationship between the two powers.
For the sake of appearances, the German and Italian governments formed an anti-Comintern pact, the real value of which we understand today.
STALIN AND SPAIN
We want to stress particularly Stalin’s criminal duplicity with respect to Spain. While the Communists were denouncing the policy of non-intervention in Spain (advocated and practiced by the Western bourgeois democracies) as the worst kind of infamy, Soviet government representatives were participating in the Plymouth Committee in London and approving all of its decisions This could only cause the greatest confusion among workers Moreover, the Stalinist involvement in Spain resulted in the Republic’s submission to Soviet tutelage and led to the perpetration of the worst crimes–the plundering of the country, and the creation of the worst resentments and deepest divisions among the anti-Fascist resisters–behind the facade of unity This has been established by all too many documents and eye- witness accounts. When the history of the Spanish Revolution is written, it will clearly emerge that the worst betrayal suffered by the popular rising was at the hands of Moscow.
None of this diminishes in any way the heavy responsibility of the English and French governments in the defeat of the Spanish Republic.
AND IN CHINA AS WELL…
We should also remember that the first invasion of Chinese territory was undertaken by the Soviet government (before the Japanese invasion of 1931), in order to take possession of the Eastern Railroad. The influential Paris financial paper INFORMATION observed that the Russians had provided an excellent example, one the Japanese government could use in its turn.
The above summary establishes that the Russo-German pact–which obviously encouraged the Nazi regime to carry out its aggression against Poland–fits into the consistent Stalinist pursuit of two-faced policies and betrayals.
THE INACTIVE PROLETARIAT
Has the proletariat been equal to its task and its aspirations? No one could dare to answer yes.
Under the pretext of pacifism, proletarians have abstained from opposing the Fascist project, and have remained passive in the face of the gravest developments. There has been no pressure on governments, no direct action, no international solidarity.
The proletariat as a class has remained indifferent to all of the crimes, gloomily anticipating something, if not the worst, from a war that cannot be escaped. At the same time, it tolerates the very conditions that heighten the danger. Nothing has been gained by people saying, “we’re not at all interested in China,” “we’re not concerned about the Ethiopians,” or “Spain isn’t worth risking a war over.”
Nor was anyone concerned about Austria, Czechoslovakia, Albania, the Lithuanian seaport of Memel, Poland, etc. In fact, aggression in all of these places served to reinforce Fascist power and influence in the world–and war continued to loom as the final result.
Those who are inactive are always in the wrong. And this is especially true of the tens of millions of so-called conscious and organized people who have been inactive in the face of history’s most significant events, developments that will shape the fate of humanity for decades to come. What happened? Is it possible that, as a result of the tumultuous times, the workers had no plan of their own to elaborate and impose on their masters, the lords of state and industrial exploitation? The organized labor movement allowed itself to be absorbed by the state, submitted to its yoke, reduced to a passive instrument, counting for nothing as an international force.
We need to resist this actively; and we must not limit ourselves simply to negative responses.
THE MOST ESSENTIAL RIGHT
This year, as the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of the Rights of Man is being celebrated, we anarchists demand an indispensable right, without which all other rights are mere illusions. Simply stated, no one should be required to kill others or to expose themselves to being killed.
Every individual’s life belongs to him or her, and no one else can require that it be taken away. We honor those who have voluntarily sacrificed their lives for a great idea, in a struggle for liberty. But it is the worst kind of degradation, it is absolute slavery, to allow anyone else the monstrous right to dispose of the existence of others.
What else can be said about the soldier’s obligation to kill? Human life has been earnestly declared sacred, especially after the execution of some tyrants, by the very people who then demand that we assassinate strangers–those guilty of nothing more than the inability to, or ignorance of how to, get out of military service–people just like ourselves.
This is the great dilemma posed by conscience, which all our spiritual pundits have avoided considering.
OUR TASK
In these terrible times, with the cannons already booming, as the carnage intensifies-workers!, comrades!: we must resist becoming entangled in the ugly passions engendered by war State violence has never been based on reason or humanitarian goals. We must remember now and forever that our enemy is our master, and that war has been planned and sought by masters, and masters must be eliminated to ensure a world at peace.
Where some have power over others, where some people exploit others, the result is rivalries, competition, ambitions, hatreds, usurpations, persecutions–which sooner or later must end in armed conflict.
Those who have so often insisted on effective power, on a government that really governs, on respect for authority, today they can see for themselves what these are leading to. The worst kind of disorder is not anarchy, as they always claim, but war, which is the highest expression of authority.
Workers, we must not despair in the presence of such collective madness. The time may come when things will change, when people will see a glimmer of truth amidst the worst barbarity. We must cease allowing our actions to be shaped by events. We need to prepare ourselves to give events a new direction, to revive the sentiments of mutual aid, fairness and fraternity. Only then can we bring into being the kind of justice invoked by Michelet: “the justice that we call by its ‘nom de guerre’– Revolution.”
