broken, and they are dragged into the capitalist whirlpool. Capitalism itself gradually procures for the vanquished the means and resources for emancipating themselves. And they set out to obtain the objective which once seemed to the European nations to be the highest object: national unity as a means to obtain economic and cultural freedom. This movement for national independence threatens European capital in its most valuable fields of exploitation, where the most radiant prospects are opening up before it, and in those places European capital can only maintain its domination by continually increasing its military forces."99
To this must be added that it is not only in new countries, but also in the old, that imperialism is leading to annexation, to the intensifying of national oppression, and, consequently, also to increasing resistance.
Kautsky, while objecting to the strengthening of political reaction by imperialism, leaves in the shade the very burning question of the impossibility of unity with the opportunists during the imperialist epoch. While objecting to annexations, he couches his arguments in a form which will be most acceptable and least offensive for the opportunists. He is directly addressing a German audience, yet he mitigates the most topical and important facts, for instance the annexation by Germany of Alsace-Lorraine. Let us take an example to appreciate this "deviation of thought." Let us suppose that a Japanese condemns the annexation of the Philippine Islands by the Americans. Will many believe that he protests because he has a horror of annexation, and not because he has a desire himself to annex the Philippines?
