Willi Münzenberg was a key organizer of the historic founding conference of the League Against Imperialism held in Brussels on February 10, 1927 he anticipates in this article. Called by the Communist International, the meeting gathered 175 delegates, the majority from the colonial world and its liberation movement. Aside from Communists, representatives from the Kuomintang (soon to violently leave the alliance with the CCP), The Indian National Congress (including Nehru), the African National Congress (by its President, Josiah Tshangana Gumede), and Albert Einstein among others

‘For a Colonial Conference’ by Willi Münzenberg from International Press Correspondence. Vol. 6 No. 58. August 26, 1926.

In contrast to the II. International, the III. International has always paid the greatest attention, since its inception, to the movements in the colonial countries. This fact is one of the chief grounds for the hatred entertained by the Imperialist States, and more especially those with big colonial possessions, such as England, against Soviet Russia, which tolerates the seat of the III. International in Moscow. For the first time since Karl Marx coined, in the Communist Manifest, the proud injunction: “Proletarians of all countries, unite!”, an international workers association is really trying to unite the workers of all countries, the proletarians of the whole world, without distinction of colour and race, and weld them together in one big international community. The question of the colonial peoples has always occupied an important place at the congresses of the Communist International, in marked contrast to the Congress of the II. International in Marseilles, where this subject has been touched upon with great diffidence.

As guides to the political treatment of colonial questions, use is made of the theses, which Lenin published in the, “Communist International” of June 1920, and which might be regarded as the basis of the attitude assumed by the Communist International. In these theses, as also, later, in various guide-lines adopted by International Congresses, it has rightly been pointed out that effort should be made to connect the social fight with the national-revolutionary liberation movements in the colonial countries. The Communist International does not reject on principle armed conflict. It may well happen that, in the interests of the development of proletarian revolution, the fights for freedom carried on by oppressed nations deserve our support.

This attitude was clearly and precisely formulated by the Communist International, in contrast to the sloppy slogans of Utopian bourgeois pacifists, who in their confusion are capable of going as far as the German pacifist Gerlach, who, in his “Welt am Montag” implored victory for French arms “against the wild hordes of the Riff Kabyles”. If we support national-revolutionary movements, we naturally do so with the prospect and firm determination to carry the fight beyond the narrow bounds marked out by the Nationalist groups, not only to destroy foreign Imperialism in the colonial countries but also to defeat native Capital which is in the course of development. A striking illustration of the advisability of this strategy is to be found in the Chinese fights of late years and their development.

Quite recently and chiefly in connection with the negotiations of Germany for her inclusion in the League of Nations, the question of the acquisition and restitution of German colonies has been brought up by Pan-German circles. Various groups of colony enthusiasts are carrying on, with the tacit agreement and support of the Government, an extensive propaganda for new German colonial possessions. The Press of the Right and hundreds of provincial papers are creating the desire for colonies and dozens of retired plantation owners and retired naval captains are touring the country and giving lime-light lectures to interest the masses in the colonial idea. Propagandist methods are also employed. On the cardboard table-mats in the beer-houses, for example, such mottoes as “If we have no colonies, Germany can procure no raw materials”, may be seen.

This propaganda, which has been carried so far by Dr. Schacht, the President of the Reichsbank, that he has proposed to float colonial companies with English and French groups of capitalists and which is said to have led to the participation of the German Bank in an English company for the exploitation of the Turkish oil-wells, has provoked resistance on the part of various supporters of the Left and especially of pacifist groups. Among others, the League for Human Rights, has protested repeatedly against the agitation for colonies. Recently there was formed in Germany the League against Atrocities and Oppression in the Colonies. According to its statutes, the League has assumed the task of disclosing to the widest circles of the population the true character of colonial policy and its effect upon the oppressed colonial peoples and periodically to organise international lectures of representatives of colonial peoples.

One of the most important steps which the League has taken is the effort to convoke in the course of the present year an international conference which shall unite the representatives of numerous colonial and semi-colonial countries, as well as the representatives of organisations in all States which are sympathetically inclined towards the endeavours of colonial peoples. According to the form of invitation, the conference shall occupy itself with the following tasks:

1. Report concerning imperial oppression in the colonies. Representatives of various countries will speak upon this subject.

2. The liberation movements in the colonies and their support by the workers’ organisations in the capitalist countries.

3. The co-ordination of the national liberation fights and the social fights in the colonial countries.

4. Development of the League into a big international organisation for the purpose of supporting the liberation movements in the colonies.

If possible, the conference will be held in November in Brussels. The League has nominated a provisional committee for the purpose of arranging this conference and getting into touch with colonial organisations and parties. Numerous organisations have already communicated their approval of the conference and several have even nominated delegates to the conference.

Below we quote the most interesting of these communications.

In response to the first circular, a telegraphic declaration was received from the Government of the South China Republic:

“We are in agreement with your program and believe that a solidarity movement is necessary everywhere. Kindly let us know the particulars.”

The following declaration, also from Canton, came to hand from the Central Executive of the Kuo Min Tang-Party:

“In accordance with your request, we nominate Mr. Lian as our duly authorised representative at the International Anti-Imperialist Conference. Long live the unity of all who are oppressed! Central Executive of the Kuo Min Tang-Party.”

A great number of favourable declarations from India, Egypt, the Sudan, South Africa, also from the West African and American Negro Congresses, show the immense interest for the proposed Colonial Conference which has been aroused in all colonial countries. If the Conference can be convened on the lines proposed and the agenda can be adhered to and a connection can be established in the individual countries between the striving Socialist organisations and the national liberation movements, the Conference may, despite the pacifist deviations which may be anticipated, fulfil a great and general task for the further development of the colonial liberation fight. The proposed conference and the League which has been founded, therefore, deserve the support and collaboration of the whole of the revolutionary working class.

International Press Correspondence, widely known as”Inprecorr” was published by the Executive Committee of the Communist International (ECCI) regularly in German and English, occasionally in many other languages, beginning in 1921 and lasting in English until 1938. Inprecorr’s role was to supply translated articles to the English-speaking press of the International from the Comintern’s different sections, as well as news and statements from the ECCI. Many ‘Daily Worker’ and ‘Communist’ articles originated in Inprecorr, and it also published articles by American comrades for use in other countries. It was published at least weekly, and often thrice weekly. Inprecorr is an invaluable English-language source on the history of the Communist International and its sections.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/inprecor/1926/v06n58-aug-26-1926-Inprecor.pdf