The Collapse of the Second International/Chapter 6
CHAPTER VI.
Kautsky on the Gridiron.
Kautsky speaks of the "lessons" of the war in the vulgar sense. He presents these lessons in the sense of a moral horror which seizes one at the sight of the calamities of the war. In his pamphlet, "The National State," he argues as follows:—
There is no doubt, and no proof is needed, that there exist sections which are keenly interested in universal peace and in disarmament. Members of the lower middle class and small peasants, even many capitalists and intellectuals, are not linked to imperialism by interests powerful enough to counter-balance the harm inflicted upon these sections by the war and armaments (p. 21).
This was written February, 1915! The facts show that a stampede towards the imperialists took place by all the possessing classes, including the lower middle class and the "intellectuals." Kautsky, however, with a self-satisfied air, and acting like a being from another planet, ignores facts and gives us honeyed words. He judges the interests of the petty bourgeoisie not by its conduct but by the statements of certain men of the lower middle class, though at every step these men refute their statements by their deeds. It is as though we were to judge the "interests" of the bourgeoisie in general not by its deeds but by the loving speeches of middle-class priests who swear that the social order of to-day is permeated by Christian ideals. Kautsky applies Marxism in such a manner that it is purged of its substance and there remains only the word "interest," which is used in a supernatural, spiritualist sense, for it is not real economics that he has in view, but merely innocent desires for the general welfare.
Marxism examines "interests" on the basis of class contradictions and the class struggle, which come to the fore in millions of facts in everyday life. The lower middle class dreams and babbles of the weakening of (class) contradictions, and puts forward the "argument" that the intensification of class antagonisms brings in its wake "harmful consequences." Imperialism is the submission to finance-capital of all sections of the possessing class. It means the division of the world between five or six "Great" Powers, most of which are taking part in the present war. The division of the world by the Great Powers is proof that all their propertied sections are interested, in possessing colonies, spheres of interest, in oppressing other nations; it is proof that they are interested in places which yield more or less profit, and in receiving privileges which arise out of belonging to a "Great" Power and an oppressor nation.[1]
It is no longer possible for capitalism to evolve smoothly, in comparatively peaceful, cultural surroundings, and to go on extending by degrees to fresh countries. A new era has arrived! Finance capital ousts, and will oust, a given country from amongst the Great Powers. It will deprive it of its colonies and spheres of influence (as Germany, which made war on England, threatens to do), and it will deprive the lower middle class of its "Great Power" privileges and its subsidiary income. This is a fact which is being proved by the war brought about through an intensification of the contradictions—an intensification which has been recognised by every one, including Kautsky himself in his pamphlet, "The Path to Power."
And when the present struggle, caused by jealousy among the Powers, has become a fact, Kautsky begins to persuade the capitalists and the lower middle class that war is a dreadful thing and disarmament a good thing. He does this with the same manner and with the same result as that with which a Christian priest, from the pulpit, persuades capitalists that love of man is a command of God, a striving of the soul and the moral law of civilisation. What Kautsky terms economic tendencies towards "ultra-imperialism" really amounts to lower middle-class pleadings that financiers should do no wrong.
What about the export of capital? More capital is being exported to independent countries, such as the United States of America, than to colonies. What about the seizure of colonies? These have all been seized, and they are all striving to liberate themselves. Kautsky says:—
India may cease to be an English possession, but it will never come in the shape of an undivided empire, under foreign domination. (See the pamphlet quoted above, p. 49.) The striving of any industrial capitalist state to acquire for itself a colonial empire, which would enable it to dispense with drawing raw materials from other countries, would unite against itself all the other capitalist states; in addition, it would be drawn into endless exhausting wars without being brought nearer its aim. Such a policy would be the surest way to bring about the bankruptcy of the whole economic life of a State (pp. 72–73).
Does not this amount to a vulgar appeal to the financiers to renounce imperialism? To frighten capitalists with the bugbear of bankruptcy amounts to advising members of the Stock Exchange not gamble, because "many of them lose all they possess." Capital gains and concentrates in the same measure that bankruptcy overtakes competing capitalists or a competing nation. Therefore, the more pronounced and keen the economic competition i.e., the more others are driven into bankruptcy on the economic field, the stronger the desire of capitalists to drive their national rival into bankruptcy by applying military pressure. The fewer countries there are, like Turkey, to which it is as profitable to export capital as it is to export it to colonies and independent states—these cases where the financier ges a three-fold return in comparison with capital exported to a free and independent civilised country, like the United States of America—the fiercer is the struggle for the subjugation and division of Turkey, China, and so forth. Thus speaks the economic theory concerning the era of finance-capitai and imperialism; and thus speak facts.
But Kautsky turns everything into a banal middle-class "morality ": "Why." he asks, "should they become do excited and go to war to divide Turkey or to seize India?" "They will not be able to enjoy these things for long. Besides, it is better to develop capitalism according to the peaceful method. … Of course, it would be still better to develop capitalism and to expand the market by increasing wages, for such a thing is quite 'thinkable.'" To appeal like this to financiers would form the best text for a parson to preach from. The good Kautsky almost succeeded in persuading the German financiers that it was not worth while to go to war with England over her colonies, since these colonies would, in any case, soon free themselves! England's exports to and imports from Egypt from 1872 to 1912 rose at a slower rate than her imports and exports as a whole. Where from the "Marxist" Kautsky deduces the following moral:—
We have no reason to suppose that England's trade with Egypt would have increased at a slower rate, under the influence of economic factors alone, without a military occupation (p. 72). The aspirations of capital after expansion can best be attained, not by the coercive methods of imperialism but by those of a peaceful democracy (p. 70).
What a wonderfully grave, scientific "Marxist" analysis! Kautsky "has put this foolish episode in the right light," and has proved that the English had no need to deprive the, French of Egypt, and that the German financiers had no need whatsoever to begin the war, nor to organise the Turkish campaign, hand in hand with other undertakings, in order to drive the English out of Egypt! All this, claims Kautsky, is a mere misunderstanding. The English have not yet realised that it were far better to give up coercing Egypt and to adopt the methods of a peaceful democracy in order to increase the amount of capital exported. …
"Of course it was purely an illusion of middle-class Free Traders," Kautsky argues, "when they thought that Free Trade entirely does away with the economic contradictions produced by capitalism. Neither Free Trade nor democracy can remove them. Nevertheless, it is to our interest to see these contradictions overcome by a struggle assuming such forms as impose least suffering and sacrifice upon the labouring masses" (p. 73).
"Oh, Lord, tell us what is a Philistine?" asked Lassalle, and in reply quoted the well known words of a poet: "A Philistine is an empty gut filled with fear, who hopes that God will take pity on him."
Kautsky has prostituted Marxism in an unheard of manner and has become a real priest. exhorts capitalists to resort to peaceful democratic methods by what he calls dialectics. If at the commencement there was Free Trade and subsequently monopolies and imperialism, then why should there not be an "ultra-imperialism" and again Free Trade? Thus argues Kautsky, the priest, who consoles the oppressed masses by depicting for their benefit the blessing of this "ulta-imperialism," though he is not ready to say whether such a thing is "feasible" or not! Feuerbach was right when he said, in reply to those who defend religion by the argument that it is soothing to a man that such comfort has a reactionary significance, for he who comforts a slave, instead of inciting him to rebel against slavery, lends a helping hand to the slave-owners.
Every class of oppressor requires two social functions to defend his domination—the function of a hangman and that of a priest. The hangman must crush the protests and the revolts of the oppressed; the priest must picture to them perspectives (it is especially convenient to do this without guaranteeing that such perspectives can be realised) of their misery being alleviated and their sacrifices lessened, while leaving class domination intact. Thus are the oppressed reconciled to this domination and led away from taking revolutionary action. Their revolutionary frame of mind is impaired and their revolutionary resoluteness shaken. Kautsky has turned Marxism into a most loathsome and stupid counter-revolutionary theory, and into the dirty sermonising of a priest.
In 1909, in his pamphlet: "The Path to Power," Kautsky recognised that under capitalism contradictions were becoming more acute, a fact which is indisputable and which has been refuted by no one. He also recognised that an era of wars and revolutions and a new "revolutionary period" were drawing nigh. And, again, he declares that no revolution can take place "prematurely," and calls it "downright treason to our cause" if we refuse to reckon with the possibility of victory during an insurrection, though before the struggle has commenced we may realise that defeat is in store for us.
The war came, and these contradictions did indeed become more acute. The misery of the masses increased enormously. The war is dragging on, and its scope is extending, but Kautsky writes pamphlet after pamphlet. Submissively following the dictates of the censor, he quotes no data concerning the pillage of lands and the horrors of war; he mentions neither the scandalous profits of war contractors, nor the high cost of living, nor the military enslavement of the mobilised workers; on the contrary, he consoles and soothes the proletariat by quoting instances of bourgeoisie wes revolutionary and progressive; or when "Marx himself" desired the victory of this or that bourgeoisie. Kautsky consoles the proletariat by quoting whole rows and columns of figures to prove the "possibility" of capitalism without colonies and pillage, without wars and armaments, to prove that the methods of a "peaceful democracy" are preferable to all others. Lacking courage to deny that the misery of the masses is becoming more acute and that a revolutionary situation has arisen before our very eyes (the censorship will not permit this to be spoken of!). Kautsky cringes before the capitalists and the opportunists by picturing the possibility (though i! is impossible to guarantee its feasibilty) of certain forms of struggle, in a new phase, when there will be "less suffering and less sacrifice." …
Franz Mehring and Rosa Luxemburg are right in having dubbed Kautsky a prostitute (Maedchen fuer alle).
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In August, 1905, there existed a revolutionary situaition in Russia. The Tsar promised a Duma, à la Bulygin, to "console" the seething masses. Bulygin's legislative consultative regime could "ultra-absolutism," if one may use the term, "ultra-imperialism" in regard to the renunciation of armaments by financiers and an agreement between them to observe a "lasting peace." Let us suppose for a moment that to-morrow a hundred of financiers of the world, whose interests are interlinked in a hundred different gigantic concerns promise the nations to uphold disarmament after the war. (We must make this supposition for a moment in order to follow out to the end the political deductions from Kautsky's half-baked theory.) Even in such a case would it not be treason to the proletariat to counsel it to refrain from revolutionary action, without which action all promises and fine schemes are but a mirage.
The war has not only brought the capitalist class enormous profits and splendid prospects of fresh plunder—Turkey, China, etc.—it has brought new orders running into hundreds of millions and new loans at a higher rate of interest. More than that, it has brought the capitalist class even still greater political gains in that the proletariat has been split and corrupted! Kautsky aids this corruption and gives his blessing to the international cleavage in the ranks of the proletarians who fight in the name of unity—a unity with the opportunists of the various nations, the Suedekums! Yet we come across persons who do not understand that the war cry of unity amongst the old parties means the "unity" of a nation's proletariat with its national bourgeoisie. Neither do they realise that this form of national unity is based upon the wrecking of the international unity of the world wide working class!
- ↑ E. Schulze says that in 1915 the securities of the whole world amounted to £29,280,000,000, includine State and communal loans, as well as moragates and shares of commercial and industrial companies, etc. Of this sum England held £5,200,00,000, the United States of America £4,600.000.000, France £4,000.000.000, and Germany £3.000,000.000—that is to say, these four Great Powers held £16,000.000.000, or more than one-half of the total. From this we may judge how great are the advantages and privileges of the nations which are Great Powers and which have outstripped other nations by oppressing and plundering them. (Dr. Emil Schultze: "Das franzoesische Kapital in Russland" in the "Finanz-Archiv." Berlin. 1915, vol. xxxii., p. 127.) For the Great Powers. "national defence" signifies defence of the right to the booty obtained by plundering other nations. In Russia, as we know, capitalist imperialism is weaker, but feudal militarism is more powerful.