Emanuel Levin on the ideological and organizational struggle among veterans after the Bonus March of 1932. Levin reviews the history of organizations like the American Legion and the V.F.W., ad the propaganda use of veterans by imperialism. Not content to give the right the constituency, in the 1930s, the Communists built the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League to fight for veteran’s needs and organize them for anti-fascist defense and strike picket duty.

‘The Veterans in the Struggle Against Fascism and Imperialist War’ by Emanuel Levin from The Communist. Vol. 13 No. 8. August, 1934.

ON  THE eve of the 20th anniversary of the World War, the International des Anciens Combattants (International of Veterans)–I.A.C.–through its chairman, Henri Barbusse, calls on the veterans of the world to join in the struggle against war and fascism. This call announces the convening of the Seventh International Congress of the I.A.C., which will be held in Brussels on July 29, 1934.

The call points out that the Congress

“…will study particularly, aside from the sacrifice of the maimed and disabled of the war, their parents and children, the developing imperialist war and fascism and the redoubled efforts incumbent upon us for the united struggle of all workers against these two plagues.

“Today, 20 years after the. declaration of war, the voice of the survivors is raised more strongly and powerfully than ever…

“And today, after the most terrible of wars, we are on the eve of one that will be more terrible.

“Just as between the people of the world two broad currents have been formed, that of the enslavers and their tools, and that of the liberators, a like separation has taken place between the men who escaped the massacres of 1914-1918. The International des Anciens Combattants has brought together all those who fight against war in a logical and loyal manner, by fighting against reaction and imperialism, the fomenters of war, by fighting for the establishment of a better society, a society of work, peace and justice.”

We must answer this call. We must ask ourselves, how are the veterans in the United States now participating in the international struggle against war and fascism? How can we bring the veterans more effectively into the struggle against war and fascism?

In order to understand how to win over in a broad united front to the side of the militant working masses the veterans, who represent 10 per cent of the electorate and with their families reach close to 20-30 per cent of the population, it is necessary:

1. To analyze the development by the American bourgeoisie of its Stahlhelm, the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars, and the use of these by the bourgeoisie as one of the instruments for preventing the workers from putting up any kind of organized resistance to the imperialist war policy.

2. To expose the social-chauvinist influences, the “sophistries and catch-phrases”, and the development of fascist forms within the ranks of the veterans.

3. To analyze the reaction of the veterans to these plans of the bourgeoisie.

Basing ourselves on these, we can put forward a definite and concrete program for winning over the masses of the veterans for the revolutionary struggle against war and fascism.

THE AMERICAN LEGION–THE STAHLHELM OF AMERICAN FINANCE CAPITAL

The resolution of the Sixth World Congress of the Communist International on the struggle against imperialist war points out the following in relation to the veterans:

“The bourgeoisie is taking measures to prevent the workers from putting up any kind of organized resistance to their war policy…” On the other hand, the unofficial armies of the type of the Stahlhelm in Germany…pursue the aim of strike-breaking and forcible suppression of the workers, not only in time of war, but also in the period of war preparations.”

In France, even before the American soldiers were demobilized, the bourgeoisie prepared for control of the veterans when they should return home. The official History of the American Legion shows that the policy of the Legion was to organize and control the returning soldiers. The author points out that for the first time it was noted that the spirit for revolution appeared in the ranks of the English-speaking soldiers. He cited as an example the “Winnipeg Soviets” (the fact that war veterans participated in the Winnipeg general strike).

Immediately on the return of the soldiers, the American Legion posts were subsidized throughout the country by the war profiteers. Legion posts were organized in all major and basic industries and establishments. These were given meeting places and every facility for carrying on their activities. The wives were formed into auxiliaries, and now the sons of the veterans are being organized. World War nurses formed independent posts or were admitted into membership in various posts. At the same time Negro veterans were immediately set up into Jim-Crow posts.

While they are being built up as “unofficial” armies, these organizations are used as brakes on the demands of the rank-and-file veterans for pensions and relief.

Throughout the country their slogan was on all signboards:

“We serve in peace as in war.”

On National Defense Day in 1928, the American Legion posts were organized in every State. They had infantry units as well as air units. Their lobby in Washington is rated as one of the most efficient and powerful. It is the supporter of all measures for increased armaments, and, together with the powder and war chemical lobby, is credited with being the cause for the Senate vote against a treaty which would have brought the United States into an international agreement outlawing the use of chemical gases during war. In nearly every major strike the officers of the American Legion deputized their most backward elements. In mass demonstrations where conflicts arose against the government these officers were again brought into line with the forces of “law and order”.

The American Legion commanders devote most of their time and efforts in countrywide tours to a continuous attack upon the Soviet Union. These tours were carried out through joint cooperation of the leaders of the American Federation of Labor with Hamilton Fish, arch enemy of veterans’ relief legislation. At the same time, one of the national vice-commanders pinned the emblem of the American Legion on the breast of Mussolini and attended the International Convention of Fascists in Vienna. The membership of the American Legion is estimated at over 750,000.

VETERANS OF FOREIGN WARS

The Veterans of Foreign Wars (V.F.W.) was organized in 1899, immediately after the Spanish-American War, and has about a quarter of a million members. It comes forward more demagogically for the immediate demands of the veterans than does the American Legion. It passed resolutions for the repeal of the Economy Act and for the immediate payment of the “Bonus”. It carries on no mass struggle for the demands of the veterans, but depends on “regular procedure” through individual lobbying in Washington. Not to be outdone in their services to the “fatherland”, they carry on a program of organizing “disintegrating and counter-irritant groups within the radical groups;” in other words, “intelligence and provocateur” groups.

The bourgeoisie realizes that large sections of the veterans cannot be held permanently under such openly reactionary leadership as the American Legion. The V.F.W. is, therefore, used as a means of taking up this “slack”. Through their demagogic phrases they recruit some of the veterans who drop out of the Legion. The V.F.W. leadership, like that of the American Legion, plays a faithful role in support of American imperialism.

Further to prepare and to hold the veterans on the side of imperialism, 30,000 veterans are sent into the C.C.C. to “season” them for war and to set them up as “leaders” (non-commissioned officers) of the youth in the regular C.C.C.

As a final action of fully preparing these organizations for participating in the war preparations, the last Congress voted 75,000 rifles for use by these veterans’ organizations on the pretext that they are to be employed for military ceremonies, funerals, parades, etc.

SOPHISM AND SOCIAL-CHAUVINISM WITHIN THE RANKS OF THE VETERANS

Lenin pointed out the danger of sophistries and catchwords by which the bourgeoisie and social-democracy try to justify war. He pointed out that the war “turned opportunism into social-chauvinism; it changed the alliance of the opportunists with the bourgeoisie from a secret to an open one”.

The Sixth World Congress of the Comintern reemphasized the need “to expose in proper time the sophistries and catchwords by which the bourgeoisie and social-democracy try to justify war”.

The bourgeoisie is at work with its social-chauvinism and sophism within the ranks of the veterans and the workers as a whole. The Socialist Party is betraying itself as an ally of the leaders of the various veteran organizations.

The National Tribune, the oldest veteran publication in the United States, devoted its main editorials on June 7 to exposing the fact that the fortunes of American financiers come directly from the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, and the World War, and as a “corrective” it proposes to “take profits out of wars”. The relevant passage reads:

“History shows that the instigators of war, in many cases, are those who profit. With the profit taken out of war those interests will be less prone to send the flower of our youth into battle to be killed or maimed.”

To any class-conscious worker this is a flagrant piece of trickery to spread the propaganda of a “better kind” of war.

But the New Leader of June 6, 1934, printed on its front page an article signed “By a Veteran” which lauds this article in the National Tribune. It states:

“After making due allowance for the emphasis placed upon the necessity of ‘adequate preparedness’…the fact remains that the publication of this and many similar editorials in the leading ex-servicemen’s paper of the United States shows that many of the veterans’ leaders now occupy nearly the same position as the Socialists regarding the causes of modern wars.

“I advise every one of our open-air speakers to…get a copy of the issue of June 7.”

What are some of these “similar editorials” in praise of which the New Leader offers its columns?

We refer our readers to some of the other “similar editorials” which the article in the New Leader so highly commends.

The Foreign Service, official organ of the V.F.W., presents the following editorial in its July issue:

“THE HAPPY MEDIUM”

“Members of the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States believe there is a happy medium between a policy of pacifism and the militaristic view of those who would profit in some way from the business of war.

“This organization will never give its endorsement to any movement that deliberately or indirectly seeks to incite armed conflicts. Neither will it lend its approval to any policies that would leave this nation and its people helpless and unprepared in the face of a serious emergency.”

We draw attention to the emphasized phrase to indicate the sly loop-holes through which these “anti-war” demagogues intend to slip in their support of imperialism.

Here is exactly what Lenin meant when he so sharply and effectively exposed social-chauvinism and sophist catch-phrases.

The Socialist Party of America has made no comment on the article appearing in the New Leader. In this very silence, which means acquiescence, is revealed the collaboration of the Socialist Party with the bourgeoisie, its alliance with the fascist leaders of the United States in the ranks of the veterans.

The real intention of the “Left” socialists under the leadership of Norman Thomas, as regards war, is to be seen from the admission made by Thomas in the New Leader for June 16:

“Our declaration deals with the kind of war that our analysis of facts leads us to expect. If by some miracle there is a wholly different type of war, there will be plenty of time in the light of Socialist principles to change our position.”

What does this mean, if not a loop-hole for smuggling in the support of American imperialism on the pretense that the next may be “a wholly different type of war”?

VETERANS IN THE ANTI-WAR STRUGGLE

With such phrases and such alignments, the leaders of the American Legion and of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, aided by the Socialist Party leadership, are disarming the masses and leaving them unprepared for a revolutionary struggle against war.

THE VETERANS AND THE STRUGGLE AGAINST FASCISM

The development of fascism is an integral part of the war preparations. The bourgeoisie sees that there are 3,000,000 unorganized and unattached veterans in addition to those in the government­controlled veteran organizations. Close to 2,000,000 of these are unemployed. These must be “controlled”.

The revolt of the veterans against the leadership of reactionary veteran organizations, as indicated in the Bonus March, not only marked the beginning of an independent movement of the rank and file of the veterans in the various bourgeois· veteran organizations, but also exposed the plans of forming these into fascist bands or at least using them as a base for such bands.

The Khaki Shirts formed out of this march soon became fertile soil for Nazi machinations. Count Kurt von Ludtke, the Nazi press representative in the United States, soon made contacts with the leaders of these groups. While in the main they failed to turn the Khaki Shirt oufits into Nazi organizations, they nevertheless helped in the incorporation of the American Nationalists. Walter W. Waters, of the 1932 Bonus March, acted as its figurehead. This organization, for want of immediate support, remains only on paper. The Khaki Shirt group of Art Smith was an independent movement and had no connection with the Khaki Shirts formed in Washington, but it is, nevertheless, an indication of the line of approach in mobilizing veterans for fascism. In every such movement, as in the Silver Shirts, the veterans are brought in as a support.

These are only the incipient efforts of the bourgeoisie in its program to win over the veterans for war and fascism.

Together with this plan of actual fascist groups among the unattached veterans, the bourgeoisie is fostering to a very marked degree the nationalist spirit which is one of the characteristics of developing fascism.

President Roosevelt, in his attack on the veterans, with the full support of the Republicans as well as the Democrats, expresses the sentiments of monopoly capital. The appeal to the veterans and the masses as a whole is on the basis of patriotism.  It has become so effective in some cases that groups of veterans, not very large groups, have a feeling that the government, “their” government, would suffer greatly if they were to be paid their Bonus now; if they maintained in force the favorable veteran legislation which they themselves have won through bitter struggles.

RADICALIZATION OF THE VETERANS

What has been the reaction of the veterans to this steady program of betrayals and social-chauvinist influences in their ranks? In spite of the patriotic camouflage created around all veteran activities, the veterans, like all other sections of the masses affected by the bitter aftermath of the World War, have carried on militant actions, and a steady process of radicalization has developed within their ranks. The existence of a series of laws providing not only for those veterans who were able to prove that their injuries or disabilities were caused directly by the war, but laws known as disability allowance laws, which provided for relief of all disabled veterans, indicates the steady pressure that the rank and file has exerted on all sessions of Congress since the World War.

The passage of the “Bonus” Bill, which is in reality an adjustment of the war-time pay of the veterans, came only after a long and bitter struggle by the rank-and-file veterans. The fight for its immediate payment, instead of its payment in 1945, was brought to its highest point in the historic Bonus March of 1932.

These are the general indications of the veterans’ struggles against the government. However, these were yet largely disconnected with the general struggles of the masses.

UNITY WITH THE MASSES

In 1930, with the formation of the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League, we see the first signs during this crisis of the alignment organizationally of a section of the veterans with the working class movement, coordinating their struggles and demands with those of the masses as a whole. The deepening of the crisis which affected the millions of veterans themselves, the agitation for relief, the wage cutting in industry, the allotment of billions of dollars to the same bankers and industrialists who were attacking the veterans and their pensions, created the necessary favorable base for winning over the veterans to unity with the masses in actual struggle.

Beginning with 1930, we see veterans in the front lines of May Day demonstrations. War veterans and the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League become active in the support of the Communist Party. The Communist Party comes forward in the election campaigns for the demands of the veterans. When, in 1932, the representatives of the W.E.S.L., testifying before the Ways and Means Committee, called for the march of the veterans to Washington, it awakened a general feeling for action, for motion in the direction of Washington, “their” government, to demand their “Bonus”.

Even on this march, the mention of “worker” or of the unemployed meant attacks by the special military police set up by the Waters group who were controlled by the administration, through the demagogy of Glassford, then Chief of Police in Washington.

However, within the following six months we see the first united front between the radical and the conservative elements among the rank and file of the veterans.  Former members and officers of the B.E.F. and Khaki Shirts, together with the representatives of the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League, formed the Veterans National Liaison Committee. In May, 1933, about 5,000 veterans from every part of the United States were again assembled in Washington and in May, 1934, about 1,500 were massed together once more in a united front program. Their program now is unity with the unemployed and the farmers. The question of the “Reds”, the Communist Party, when raised, was settled on the principle of the right of every veteran to hold whatever political opinion he desires. Communist Party representatives are invited to speak along with representatives from all other political parties. Members of the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, and other veteran organizations sit jointly in united front committees with W.E.S.L. members.  Negro and white veterans sit together in committees.  Even in the first Bonus March there was comparatively little evidence of white chauvinism practiced in the various billets; but in 1934, unity of Negro and white veterans was one of the political characteristics of the Convention. (This does not mean that within the ranks of the veterans white chauvinism has been completely eliminated.) Finally, the Convention went on record against war and fascism.

In the recent strikes, as in Minneapolis, we see that the officials of the American Legion cannot so easily deputize its members for strike activities. The commander of the Fifth District of the Legion officially stated that he could not deputize his membership because to do so was against the Constitution of the American Legion. It took him two days to give this answer. The reason was quite simple; the men refused to be deputized.

Last May Day in New York, the officers of the Veterans of Foreign Wars were forced to call off their counter-demonstration against the Communist Party because, as they had to admit, they could not mobilize enough of their members for that purpose.

These are only a few of the indications of the growing solidarity within the ranks of the bourgeois-controlled veteran organizations. In the 1934 Veterans Rank-and-File Convention in Washington, it was the unattached who came out most strongly for the unemployed and farmers as against a program limited to specific veteran demands.

Such organized actions, though carried through by a small and ill-prepared massing of veterans in Washington, indicate, however, the general tendency toward united action around the most common demands of the masses today. They mark the development of revolt on the part of the rank and file in bourgeois veteran organizations.

THE DANGER OF SECTARIANISM

However, while these very favorable objective conditions exist, we must note that there is still in the ranks of the even more class-conscious elements within the veteran movements, the serious danger of sectarianism. The approach to the united front with the members of the veterans of the officer-controlled organizations is being hindered by “Leftist” tendencies of refusing to work together with these elements. At the same time, we also find a serious underestimation of our veterans’ problems among the revolutionary sections of the workers, in the shops, unions, mass organizations, and even in some sections of the Party itself.

Furthermore, the radical veteran movement in the United States has isolated itself from the struggle of the European veterans. While the officers of the American Legion are very mindful of their international relations through the reactionary Federation Internationale des Anciens Combattants (F.I.D.A.C.), the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League was very slow in responding to the call of international solidarity with the Internationale des Anciens Combattants (I.A.C.), of which Henri Barbusse is the chairman and Hugo Graef, former Communist member of the Reichstag and now in the hands of the Nazis, was secretary. This isolation becomes even more clear when it is noted that the I.A.C. was formed in 1920 and that only in 1932 did the Workers Ex-Servicemen’s League affiliate with it.

While the American Legion officers devote their major time to slandering the Soviet Union, we have failed to establish fraternal relations with the veterans in the Soviet Union who are affiliated with the I.A.C., and in this way create international solidarity with the veterans of the Soviet Union and help to break the anti-Soviet influence of the leaders of the American Legion.

These tendencies and shortcomings must be quickly eradicated so that the veterans can be brought into the main line of struggle against imperialist war and fascism, a line which is now being hammered out through their joint struggles in resistance to the cuts in their compensation, allowances, and pensions, and through their simultaneous struggle for the support of the unemployed, the farmers, and on the picket lines during strikes.

THE TASKS BEFORE US

This analysis of the various forces at play in the ranks of the veterans’ movement gives us a clearer foundation for developing the line of march in the struggles to win the veterans to the side of the masses for a revolutionary struggle against war and fascism.

First and foremost this struggle must be based on the every-day needs of the veterans:

1. (a) The veterans must be drawn into active struggle against the Economy Act which deprives the wounded veterans of their compensation, allowances, and pensions. (b) An intensive and united fight must be conducted for the immediate cash payment of the adjusted service certificates (Bonus). (c) The veterans must engage in struggles in those States in which they are faced with loss of benefits because of changes in the State veteran relief laws. (d) They must carry on active struggle in behalf of the demands of the Negro veterans.

2. These struggles must be closely linked up with the struggles of the employed and unemployed workers and of the poor farmers for the Workers’ Unemployment and Social Insurance Bill, H.R. 7598, and the Farmers’ Emergency Relief Bill.

3. Veterans as such should be drawn into and formed as groups in the ranks of the unions, strikers, and on the picket lines.

4. The groups of veterans in these activities should be drawn into the struggles of the masses against imperialist war and fascism.

5. The independent movement of the veterans should be developed so that it becomes directly connected with the international struggle against war and fascism through active participation with, and support of, the I.A.C.

6. Fraternal relations should be developed with the veterans in the U.S.S.R. by a steady course of correspondence and through delegations of invalid or disabled veterans to the U.S.S.R.

METHODS OF ORGANIZATION

The methods through which this program can be carried through must be:

1. The development and building of posts of the Workers Ex­-Servicemen’s League in neighborhoods and shops.

2. The building of friendly groups of veterans in bourgeois veteran organizations for a common struggle on the united front program of veterans’ demands which was established in the Rank­-and-File Convention in Washington, May 10-28, 1934.

3. The organizing of groups of unattached veterans on a residential or an election district sub-division basis around this common united front program.  

4. The drawing of Negro veterans into all committees in the leadership of this movement.

5. The carrying through of an intensive campaign to build Veterans Rank-and-File Committees on the plan of the Veterans National Rank-and-File Convention in Washington, D.C.

It is only with such political perspectives and through the active participation of the veterans in daily struggles for their immediate needs, through the raising of these economic and political struggles to a higher political level as an integral part of the struggle against the bourgeoisie, that we can bring these sections of the masses into the revolutionary struggle against imperialist war and fascism.

The recent struggles of the veterans in the United States prove clearly that these forces can be won over to the side of the revolutionary struggle against American imperialism.

It now, more than ever before, becomes the duty of the class-conscious sections of the masses to support the veterans in order to hasten the process of winning them over for revolutionary struggle.

1. Fight for the demands of the veterans-£or the immediate cash payment of the Bonus and the repeal of the Economy Act!

2. Veterans! Join the struggle against fascism and imperialist war!

3. Support the masses in their struggle against the N.R.A. which is used as a means of war preparation!

4. Expose the reactionary leaders of the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, etc., who are leading the veterans into another imperialist war!

5. Negro and white veterans, unite!

6. Support the Seventh World Congress of the I.A.C.!

There are a number of journals with this name in the history of the movement. This ‘Communist’ was the main theoretical journal of the Communist Party from 1927 until 1944. Its origins lie with the folding of The Liberator, Soviet Russia Pictorial, and Labor Herald together into Workers Monthly as the new unified Communist Party’s official cultural and discussion magazine in November, 1924. Workers Monthly became The Communist in March, 1927 and was also published monthly. The Communist contains the most thorough archive of the Communist Party’s positions and thinking during its run. The New Masses became the main cultural vehicle for the CP and the Communist, though it began with with more vibrancy and discussion, became increasingly an organ of Comintern and CP program. Over its run the tagline went from “A Theoretical Magazine for the Discussion of Revolutionary Problems” to “A Magazine of the Theory and Practice of Marxism-Leninism” to “A Marxist Magazine Devoted to Advancement of Democratic Thought and Action.” The aesthetic of the journal also changed dramatically over its years. Editors included Earl Browder, Alex Bittelman, Max Bedacht, and Bertram D. Wolfe.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/communist/v13n08-aug-1934-communist.pdf