This, the full text of the Executive Committee’s theses, is the authoritative Communist International statement on Britain’s 1926 General Strike.

‘The Lessons of the British General Strike’ Theses of the Communist International from Workers Monthly. Vol. 5 No. 10. August, 1926.

1. THE CRISIS OF BRITISH CAPITALISM.

a. The general position of British national economy in the world economic system and at the same time the general position of Great Britain as an imperialist state may be characterized as that of a steady process of decline. Even before the war the competition of a number of countries, above all Germany and U.S.A., threatened the monopolist position of Great Britain and gradually relegated her to a secondary position. The war and the post-war development greatly intensified this basic tendency, complicating and partly changing its forms. The growth of the U.S.A.; the economic and political strengthening of France and of Japan to a certain extent; the industrialization of the British colonies and dominions, with an increase in their centrifugal tendencies; the National Debt with all the consequences arising therefrom; the limitation of the purchasing capacity of the markets still within the purview of Great Britain; the partial withdrawal of Russia from the former trading system; the growth of the revolutionary movement in the colonial and dependent countries (such as China); finally, the relative technical and organizational backwardness as compared with the U.S.A. and Germany, due to the parasitic manifestations accruing from Great Britain’s monopolist position in the world market,—all these factors are summed up in the chronic crisis of British capitalism. Great Britain can no longer be spoken of as the “workshop of the world.” Her role as “monopoly ruler of the waves” is steadily disappearing.

b. A most important component part of the general decline of British capitalism is the chronic and increasingly acute crisis in the British mining industry. This branch of industry, which is directly connected with about 8 1/2% of the British population, with a yearly output of £250,000,000 and exports equaling 10% of the entire British exports, was the basis of British economic power. Thus, the decline of the coal industry is a decisive indication of the general decay of British capitalism. The output of coal shows a steady fall (270 million tons in 1909-13, 267 million tons in 1924, and 244 million tons in 1925.) Home consumption from 1909 to 1925 inclusive decreased from 182 million tons to 175 million tons, particularly due to the decreased demands on the part of the metal industry. Exports of British coal have been and are being reduced most of all; in 1903-13 they comprised 88 million tons; in 1924, 82, and in 1925 only 69 million tons (see Report of the Royal Commission on the Coal Industry p. 4.). British coal is being systematically ousted from a number of markets: in Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, Belgium, in the South African and South American countries, in the East, in the British dominions, etc. This descending curve of the coal industry has both general and specific causes: the competition of other forms of fuel in connection with technical progress (electricity and “white coal,” oil, progress in fuel technique); the technical backwardness of the British mining industry and the relative exhaustion of the coal mines, backward organizational forms of mining management; decreased purchasing power of the coal consumers; the competition of other countries including the Dominions, due to the development of their own industry and regrouping of markets.

c. From the point of view of the main perspective of development, the profound crisis in the British coal industry connected with the general crisis of British economy and tremendous chronic unemployment will lead to a radical change in the method of production, i.e., to the basic task of the proletarian revolution. For the radical way out of the blind alley is to destroy the relics of feudalism (absolute rent bugdening industry); the abolition of private property which is the only way of obtaining the necessary planned production and definite technical reorganization; real guarantee of peace and collaboration in the field of international relations, including the “colonies,” which is inconceivable on a capitalist basis; and finally to get the proletariat itself profoundly interested in the process of production, which is only possible under the victorious dictatorship of the working class. The schemes for emerging from the cul-de-sac put forward by the bourgeois and social reformist ideologists in present conditions are partly utopian (for instance, the plans for an international export cartel proposed by Messrs. Mond, Keynes, Brailsford, Hodges & Co.), partly propose pressure on the working class which will inevitably lead sooner or later to the revolt of the proletariat and raise the fundamental question of power in the country: The coal crisis is thus the barometer of the social revolution.

2. THE DECLINE OF GREAT BRITAIN AND THE BRITISH LABOR MOVEMENT.

a. In line with the former long sustained power of Great Britain and her ruling position on the world market, a historically evolved type of labor movement developed. British capitalism of its classic period also begot the classic type of British trade unionism. Its social-economic bases were the surplus profits received by the British bourgeoisie from all corners of the globe and partially transformed into a component element of the British workers’ wages. On this basis the proletariat raised its standard of living and its conditions of production. The British proletariat, therefore, became a specially privileged section of the international army of labor, a labor aristocracy, to a certain extent economically bound up with the general interest of their masters. This “bourgeoisified proletariat” (Engels) had the most skilled section of the workers in its midst, a 100% aristocracy which proved to be a purveyor of trained servants of capital, “the labor lieutenants of the capitalist class.” This social condition of the British proletariat also created its opportunist social-consciousness: craft outlook, indifference to politics together with the fetish of legality, parliament, king and church; “Fabian Socialism” with admiration for gradualness and disgust for revolutionary violence; finally “Guild” Socialism, and the “constructive” Socialism of Mr. MacDonald which in substance denies the class struggle of the proletariat all along the line. It is on this basis that the open corruption in the upper sections of the labor bureaucracy arose.

b. The commencement of the decline of British capitalism and the accompanying process of decrease in the imperialist surplus profits of the British bourgeoisie produced a radical change in relations between classes and within the working class itself. The increase of class antagonisms led to a sharp decrease in the political importance of traditional British liberalism, which had been the prevailing ideology of the bourgeoisie and had systematically extended bourgeois influence over the proletariat. The strengthening of the Conservatives on the one hand, and the growth of the labor movement on the other; the general leftward trend of the working class, the increased strike struggle (railwaymen’s strike in 1911, general strike of miners in 1912, strike wave in 1913, railwaymen’s strike in 1919, strike of miners in 1921); the appearance of factory committees, committees of action, the formation of the Communist Party and the birth of the “Minority Movement,” the campaign for rapprochement with the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics, the constitution of the Anglo-Russian committee under pressure of the masses, the general strike and the present miners’ strike—all these are links in the same chain of development.

c. The process of liberating the British working class from influence of opportunism does not proceed uniformly. The process of revolutionary development within the proletariat is not uniform because of the difference between the tremendous army of unemployed which is becoming a chronic phenomenon in Great Britain and the employed workers; the distinction between skilled and unskilled labor; the distinction between the workers of various trades in connection with the non-uniform development of the crisis; and finally the distinction between the organized mass and the bureaucratic official staffs.

The greatest hindrance to revolutionary ripening is the hierarchy of trade union and Labor Party officials with their leaders, who developed on the basis of former relations. The great majority of these are either conscious allies of the bourgeoisie and conscious enemies of a class labor movement, or else “Left Wingers” (“Centrists”) who, thanks to their ambiguous attitude, political cowardice and policy of capitulation inevitably arising therefrom, go over to the side of the enemy at times of crisis. The so-called “leaders of the working class” maneuver against the growth of the revolutionary activity of the masses, both in their tactics and in their ideology. The ideology of “constructive Socialism” as a means of preventative war against Communism, has widespread popularity amongst the higher political and trade union officials, while the development of the mass movement, despite vacillations and zig-zags, brings the masses more and more under the banner of fighting revolutionary Marxism, i.e., Leninism.

3. THE COAL CRISIS AND PREPARATION FOR THE STRIKE.

a. The postponement of the conflict between the miners and the mine owners in July of last year is explained by the fact that the government did not feel sufficiently prepared: the mine owners had not the necessary reserve of coal, the state authorities had not yet mustered all the forces necessary for a final fight. The main strategic policy of the bourgeoisie was determined by the desire to gain time, to reform the ranks and enter the fight with the aim of smashing the main position of the working class and the subsequent carrying out of the “reorganization of the industry” by bringing further pressure to bear on the working class and by increased exploitation. Hence the subsidies to the coal owners and postponement of a decision until May of the present year. The preparations of the bourgeoisie proceeded in various directions; these include: (1) measures of a military and police nature (special district civil commissioners, organization of a special constabulary force, organization of scabs thruout the whole country, getting the army and navy into fighting order; (2) measures for organizing a central governmental “fist,” division of labor between the “Diehards” and Baldwin who was to play the role of a mediator and conciliator “above classes”; (3) measures for organizing so-called “public opinion” (the Samuel Commission, reasons for the necessity of lowering wages, the frightening of the petty-bourgeois elements with the “terrible” consequences of “violence” on the part of the miners, the appeal to parliamentary and constitutional modes of thought on the part of the general public, etc.); (4) measures for organizing spying and treachery among the labor leaders (arrangements with Thomas, MacDonald, & Co.).

b. Whereas the bourgeoisie did everything possible to mobilize its forces and disintegrate the forces of its opponent, the official labor “leaders” did everything possible to facilitate the work of the bourgeoisie and demobilize the forces of the proletariat. The Home Secretary, Joynson Hicks, stated on April 5th, that “the Cabinet was now more anxious than during the war.” Meanwhile, the official trade union leaders as far back as August were “convinced” that it was “impossible” to make preparations in time (See article by Brailsford in “New Leader” of May 21, 1926). The main strategic policy of the Right wing leaders of the General Council (Thomas) and of the Labour Party (MacDonald) who were giving the tone to the movement consisted in holding on to the leadership in order to avert an acute development of the class struggle and in order to wreck the strike. Hence: permanent “contact” with the government and the mine owners, i.e., an open plot against the workers, a whole gamut of acts disorganizing the proletariat as a whole, commencing with the demonstrative “threats” to the government and ending with simultaneous opposition both to the miners’ strike and to the contemplated general strike. (Compare for instance the estimation of the Report of the Royal Commission given by the Communist Party which stated that the report is “a declaration of war against the whole working class” with the opinion of MacDonald that this report is our “triumph” and Hodges who proposed “accepting” this report; also compare the speech of the Labour Party member, Wedgewood, in reply to Joynson Hicks’ injunction about “keeping the Labour Party pure and chaste”; also the continual pressure exercised on the miners with simultaneous promise of “fraternal aid, etc.”). The Right leaders thus had their strategy, while the “Left Wingers” were in continual fear, had absolutely no independent position and were thereby doomed to be pulled along by the leading strings of the Right Wingers.

c. The working masses in general understood that the owners and the state were preparing a decisive attack on the working class. The lowering of the miner’s standard of living was connected in the consciousness of the masses with the inevitable reduction of the standard of living for the workers of other trades. The masses, some consciously and other spontaneously, were all for extending the struggle. The “Minority Movement” and the Communist Party consciously expressed this process. Already immediately after the appearance of the Coal Commission Report the Communist Party estimated it as a “declaration of war” (see above); on April 9th, at the Miners’ Conference it issued the slogan for “mobilizing the whole working class”; on April 23rd, it issued the slogan for a general strike in support of the miners and slogans for supporting them internationally, for the organization of “Committees of Action,” etc., developing these slogans still further (Workers’ Defence Corps, leaflets to be issued to soldiers, agreement with the cooperatives, closing down of capitalist press, etc.) and warning the workers as to possible treachery on the part of the heroes of “Black Friday” (Thomas & Co.). In the same manner the National Conference of the “Minority Movement” and the conference of miners belonging to that movement put forward a number of slogans in the direction of preparing a general strike and developing the struggle.

4. THE TREND OF THE GENERAL STRIKE AND ITS FINISH.

a. The trend of the general strike and its liquidation are a tremendous lesson for the entire international proletariat. On April 30th, the mine owners presented the miners with an ultimatum (reduction of wages, extension of hours, agreements according to district and not on a national scale). With the refusal of the miners the lockout commenced. Under pressure of the masses the General Council decided for a strike, postponing its commencement until May 1st. On the First of May the workers demonstrated their mood in tremendous processions. In the interval the Government was taking energetic steps for suppressing the workers. On May 1st, martial law was declared throughout the entire country, troops were sent to Lancashire, Scotland and Wales and all the forces of counter-revolution were mobilized. At the same time Messrs. Thomas, MacDonald and Co, took command in the General Council and the “Left Wingers” pitifully retreated to the background. Thomas & Co. “pleaded” on their knees with the government but in reality were already at one with it in its struggle against the approaching revolutionary crisis. In the words of Lansbury (article of May 22nd) “a fever of anxiety and even of fear” (fear of the masses above all) prevailed in the General Council. Whereas the strategy of the Thomases was to head the strike in order to smash it (see Thomas’ statement in Court after the 1921 strike, where as a King’s Privy Councilor he spoke of readiness to smash the strike when it might serve the ends of a “revolutionary party”), had its corresponding tactics which all the time were the tactics of smashing the strike which commenced against the will of the Thomases. The fear of events and preparations for liquidating the strike were above all to be seen in the announcement of the “purely economic” nature of the struggle. Under this pretext the “mobilization” proceeded in such a way that the General Council did not decide to publish its own paper, not issuing it until the governmental strikebreakers’ paper appeared; under this pretext the “politicians” were instructed not to take any action (which did not prevent them acting in the opposite direction); under this pretext the masses were not summoned to persistent systematic organizational work, or, what is more, to the conquest of the streets, but were called upon to engage in peaceful games of football; under this pretext a struggle was conducted against those revolutionarily inclined workers who entered the struggle without waiting for the orders of the General Council; for instance the General Council even feared bringing into the strike the workers of the vitally necessary branches of industry (electricity, gas, etc.) The leaders of the Labour Party and its parliamentary fraction behaved no less shamefully. As a matter of aet the strike developed not thanks to the leaders but against their will.

b. Whereas the labor leaders pretended they did not understand the political nature of the strike the government and bourgeoisie saw this clearly and acted accordingly. The “Manchester Guardian” defined the government policy as “a struggle for a victorious finish.” To smash the trade union movement, the basic form of the British labor movement, was at the same time put forward as the main task of the day. The “Times” wrote of the necessity of “breaking the dictatorship of the trade unions.” The “Daily Telegraph” (May 3rd) characterized the struggle as a fight between the General Council and the “constitutional government of the country.” “The memorandum issued on Saturday night,” the paper wrote, “announcing the decision of the Executive Committees to call a general strike, is in fact the proclamation of a usurping authority. The fact is that the General Council is a usurping body, and there is no room for usurpers in our constitutional system…” In accordance with this the bourgeoisie acted with all the necessary energy. The more the “labor leaders” entreated and raved, the more energetically did the government conduct its policy of a “firm hand” (note, for instance the contemptuous kicks that Baldwin gave Thomas & Co.)

c. The “Left” leaders of the General Council who have the majority on it not only offered absolutely no resistance whatsoever to the conscious betrayal of the Thomas type, but all the time marched under the orders of the Right Wing. As a matter of fact Thomas & Co. led the General Council throughout the whole length of the strike. At the commencement certain “Left” leaders were openly against it. In the middle of the strike they almost entirely departed from the scene putting themselves at the disposition of Thomas’ clique; at turning points in the strike they sometimes acted no less shamefully than Thomas (for instance Hicks and the “cursed Russian money”). They absolutely disintegrated the main force of the movement (the miners) exhorting them to surrender. Only the tremendous pressure of the mass movement compelled them to trail at its tail. Thus the “Left Wingers” objectively played a still more criminal role, for they had the majority and bore the direct responsibility for leadership of the strike.

d) The mass movement developed with unprecedented force. All information decisively refutes the talks about any considerable or supposed growing number of strikebreakers. This legend was set going by the trade union “leaders” and afterward “worked up” by Otto Bauer in the Vienna “Arbeiter-Zeitung” and in reality is a shameful slander against the British proletariat, a slander all the more revolting as it served as a screen for real traitors. The evidence of such witnesses as Lansbury, Brailsford and other shows the growing enthusiasm of the masses everywhere, criticism of the leaders from the left, workers coming out in support of the miners even independently of the General Council, the creation of a number of mass organizations, etc. In some places the masses even spontaneously came out onto the streets and resorted to methods of revolutionary violence so hateful to the reformists (destruction of scab motor-busses, closing down of bourgeois papers, calling upon soldiers not to obey orders, etc.), The organization of Committees of Action from below, the commencement of an ostensible spontaneous seizure of certain socially-important functions in various places (distribution of electric power, food, etc.) urged the development of the strike more and more towards higher forms of the movement.

e. The Second international and Amsterdam actually supported the policy of the Right Wing leaders of the general council, i.e., sabotaged the strike. The Social Democratic press systematically kept silent as to the dimensions of the strike, supported in advance a “compromise issue,” raised scares about the difficulties of the strike, emphasized the “merely economic” nature of the strike, talked about the tremendous number of strike. breakers (Oudegeest in “Het Volk” wrote of 50% of the unorganized providing strike-breakers), hurled invective not at the British bourgeoisie, but at the Communists (against their “superfluous efforts”; compare with the “strike gambling” of the Liquidators); “Vorwaerts” conducted a campaign against “Moscow” and demanded a general strike in the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics. The Amsterdam International turned down the united front with the Red International of Labor Unions sabotaged its own meetings devoted to the British strike. The Transport Workers’ International rejected the proposal of Fimmen “not to export coal through Rotterdam,” the German trade unions helped so long as it was not disadvantageous to the German bourgeoisie, etc. Only under pressure of the masses did the Second and Amsterdam Internationals decide on certain minimum steps by way of aiding the strikers. From the viewpoint of the development of the movement the policy of these organizations was a policy of sabotage.

f. The strike was liquidated because it was growing, for its leaders feared this very growth more than anything else. Brailsford wrote that “the pressure (of the masses) was so strong, that it was not a question of the difficulty of mobilizing them but of the difficulty of holding them back from the strike.” The strike could only survive and win by developing further, i.e., with a further sharpening of the class struggle. The decisive turning point was already clear when the “leaders” refused to accept monetary aid from the Soviet unions with whom they had jointly formed the Anglo-Russian Committee, giving as a motive of their refusal the fact they would be badly understood and the acceptance wrongly interpreted. Subsequently covering up this refusal by a refusal of foreign aid in general, they thereby isolated the British workers from the international proletariat. And no sooner did rumors circulate as to new attacks from the government being prepared (arrest of general council, calling up of the reserves, law against the trade unions, confiscation of trade union funds), the “leaders,” utilizing the second appearance of Mr. Samuel, betrayed the strike. With the exception of the miners and certain sections of the labor movement, the working masses, who had already entered on the revolutionary path, did not expect such treachery and returned to work at the call of the general council, which they still trusted. This trust turned into a wave of indignation. The most shameful, insulting agreements of the railwaymen and others were concluded under the direct “guidance” of Thomas & Co. The treacherous role of Thomas and others is officially documented in the British bourgeois press. For instance, the most serious bourgeois journal, the “Economist” (May 15, 1926) writes: “The strike failed because most of its organizers did not want it and did not believe that it could succeed. The chairman of the general council is a man of peace…” The former Stinnes organ “Deutsche Aligemeine Zeitung” described the railwaymen’s agreement as the “most astonishing capitulation of the trade unions conceivable after such a strike.” The tactics of the government and bourgeoisie were tactics of a determined and calculated offensive. The tactics of the trade union “leaders” were tactics of treachery and capitulation. The refusal to turn the strike into political channels really amounted to a blow at the internal mobilization of forces, The refusal of international aid was a blow against the mobilization of the external forces of the proletariat. The order for liquidation of the strike put the finishing touch to the business. The working class demobilized by its leaders, lost the first great fight in its history.

5. THE MINERS’ STRIKE AND SUBSEQUENT PERSPECTIVES.

a. The present situation (end of May, 1926) is characterized by a relative strengthening of the position of the bourgeoisie, a temporary disintegration within a considerable section of the working class, and the rallying of the revolutionary forces of the working class around the miners’ strike with a simultaneous move of the bourgeoisie to further offensive. The bourgeois press is conducting an unprecedentedly rabid campaign against the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics. Together with some of the trade union leaders it is conducting the same hue and cry against the miners. The mine owners are making attempts to conclude agreements with the miners in separate districts. A bill is being introduced into the House of Commons for changing the law on trade unions and the limitation of their rights is in preparation. The employers are endeavoring to utilize the defeat to tighten the screw still more. Under such conditions the miners’ strike, its progress and its outcome have decisive significance for the entire coming period in the development of the British (and not only of the British) labor movement. First, the possibility of a victory of the miners of a subsequent growth of the movement on a new basis, of new sections of the working class joining in the strike is by no means excluded On the other hand, the possibility of a defeat or compromise must also be taken into consideration, which would be followed by a frontal attack of the united forces of the government, bourgeoisie and the Right “labor” leaders against the proletariat with all the consequences arising therefrom: A policy of isolation, pushing out and exclusion of Communists and supporters of the “Minority Movement” from the trade unions, a decisive swing round of certain groups of trade union leaders towards the American Federation of Labor and Amsterdam, a rupture with the trade unions of the U.S.S.R., etc., etc.

b. Therefore at the present time all efforts of the real friends of the British workers should be directed towards energetic support of the miners. The tactics of the Communist Party, the Minority Movement, the Red International of Labor Unions, etc. should be based upon the most courageous and determined support of the miners both in Great Britain itself and on an international scale. Double attention should be paid to the work of jointly collecting funds in aid of the miners, boycotting coal cargoes, the extension of sympathetic strikes, etc. The widest possible mobilization of the proletarian masses must be organized around the miners’ strike. The Communists (with the exception of the unemployed) of all countries are in duty bound to make regular contributions in aid of the miners. Without this most energetic intervention and without this aid the miners’ strike may be lost, this will mean a great blow for the entire revolutionary-proletarian movement. All sections of the Comintern are obliged to take a number of most extraordinary measures in order to ensure the carrying out of this lead.

c. In the present condition of struggle, the most determined resistance must be offered in all cases and in all circumstances to all attempts of the Right Wingers to push supporters of the Minority Movement and Communists out of the positions they occupy in the trade union movement. On the other hand, the tendency which has already become fairly sharply manifest amongst the British working class—the tendency to leave the trade unions—should be recognized as one of extreme danger. (See “Workers’ Weekly,” May 21, article by A. MacManus against leaving the unions). While the rage of the most advanced workers can be very well understood, and while we can quite understand their just indignation at the treachery and scabbing of the official trade union leaders, on the other hand from the point of view of political expediency, there should be the most determined condemnation of tactics of leaving the unions, no matter in which alluring and quasi-revolutionary phrases about “new organizations,” etc., they be arrayed. (See Lenin: “Infantile Sickness of Left Wing Communism.”) The experience of the world labor movement in particular the experience of the German movement during the last few years, has shown with surprising clearness that the tactics of “self-exclusion” objectively supports the plans drawn up by the Right Wing leaders with the full approval of the bourgeoisie. These tactics lead to the loss of connection with the masses, isolation of the revolutionary elements of the movement and renders a solution of the fundamental problem—the problem of winning the masses—impossible. In the event of the victorious development of the strike, the tactics of leaving the unions would greatly retard the process of conquering the trade unions; in the event of victorious reaction, they would lead to the isolation of the best sections of the working class.

d. The main result of the general strike and the complex of phenomena connected therewith will be a process of accelerating the differentiation within the working class. Whereas it is extremely probable, even inevitable, that there will be a definite Rightward process on the part of the upper groups of leaders (both in the trade unions and in the Labor Party), on the other hand equally inevitable is the process of further revolutionizing of the masses. The economic basis of reformism in Great Britain has disappeared for ever. The shedding of parliamentary and constitutional illusions, the disclosure of the state as a class force, the inevitable disappointment in the old reformist leaders and reformist methods, the ever clearer presentation of the question of power, these factors are bound to lead to a growth of class consciousness of the workers. On the background of the fatal decline of the capitalist system in Great Britain, this in turn will lead to subsequent inevitable revolutionary struggles. Therefore the immediate task of the Communist Party of Great Britain is the energetic continuation of the policy of rallying forces and the policy of the united front preparing the working class for resistance to the inevitable capitalist offensive and the transforming this resistance into a wide revolutionary offensive movement of the proletariat.

6. THE LESSONS OF THE STRIKE.

a. The great British strike completely confirmed the Comintern estimation of the general world situation as a period of relative and temporary stabilization of capitalism, as opposed to the social democratic appreciation. The latter affirms that capitalism has already rid itself of the consequences of the war period, has secured new organizational forms for its international relations (League of Nations, etc.), while within various countries it has entered a phase of stable civil peace. Just as the colonial wars, the national revolution in China, the collapse of the Locarno Agreement, etc., display the whole precedented baseness of socialist “pacifism,” the civil war in Poland and the strike of millions of British workers, reveal the pitiful reformist Utopianism of social democracy on questions of the class struggle. These events very sharply emphasize the entirely relative nature of stabilization. The contradictions of capitalism have become unmasked (and therein lies the specific peculiarity of the present moment), but the sharpening of the crisis has not yet led to a European revolutionary situation and even in Great Britain there is not yet a revolutionary situation in the narrow sense of the word. However, with a favorable trend of events, such a situation might arise. This would ensue in the event of the defeat of the British workers through the development of the miners’ strike, or any other cause, being followed by a phase of new powerful revolutionary elan.

b. The strike of British workers has once more raised with tremendous force the question of general strike as a method of struggle. The history of the labor movement has not yet known a strike of the proletariat conducted in an industrial country in such dimensions and with such volume (The “Economist” of May 15 considers that about 5 million workers were drawn into the strike movement). The experience of the British strike has shown, despite all assertions of the bourgeoisie and renegades of the labor movement, that a strike is possible, that it can win, if it be developed. The main contradiction of this strike arising from its reformist leadership is the fact that the strike having brought out millions of workers and brought them in collision with the entire concerted apparatus of state power, i.e., being in the essential, a political strike, was conducted as a “purely economic” strike. This led it into a blind alley, the issue of which should have been to turn the strike into political channels, i.e., to transfer the struggle onto the highest phase of its development. The reformist leaders not only did not steer a course for revolution, but, terrified by the revolutionary perspective, they did not even utilize the strength of the masses to bring pressure to bear on the government and bourgeoisie in order to gain concessions of an economic order. They capitulated absolutely unconditionally, completely delivering up, not only the miners, not only the workers of the rest of the branches of industry which took part in the strike, but the entire working class. The reformist leaders capitulated because they could not emerge from the confines of their reformism, because they dared not and could not consciously continue the main tendency of the strike: the change of economics into politics. The liquidation of the strike is not bankruptcy of the strike as a method of struggle; it is the bankruptcy of its reformist leadership.

c. In this bankruptcy is revealed the bankruptcy of both wings of opportunism: both of Right Wing opportunism, brazen, openly-treacherous, consciously serving the demands of the bourgeoisie, and of the hidden capitulative opportunism (Purcell) who, thanks to his petty bourgeois political lack of character and cowardice, showed himself to be with the Right flank of opportunism at the moment of crisis. Therefore the position of the Communist Party of Great Britain adopted in its manifesto is absolutely correct. This manifesto states that “most of the so-called Left Wing have been no better than the Right. By a policy of timid silence, by using the false pretext of loyalty to colleagues to cover up breaches of loyalty to workers, they have left a free hand to the Right Wing and thus helped to play the employers’ game”. (Manifesto of Central Committee of Communist Party of Great Britain). A necessary pre-requisite for further success of the labor movement is a ruthless criticism and ruthless denunciation, not only of the Right traitors, but also of the “Left” capitulators of the general council. Without smashing opportunism in the labor movement it is impossible to smash the capitalist regime,

d. One of the most important lessons of the general strike in England consists in the conclusions on the question of the role of the trade unions in this country. The original feature of the situation does not merely consist in the fact that the overwhelming majority of the population is comprised of industrial workers, but also in the fact that the Labor Party is entirely based on the trade unions, the process of the masses towards the Left has its direct reflection above all in the trade unions, and also the fact that the Communist Party is still young and numerically weak. The experience of the strike has clearly shown that the role of the trade unions in it was tremendous; the Committees of Action organized by the trade unions actually developed into district Soviets. The departments organized by the general council already resembled in their structure and functions the departments of the Petersburg Soviet in the period of the so-called “dual power.” The slogan first issued by the Communist Party–“all power to the General Council” in the given situation, together with the slogan “Down with the Baldwin Government, defender of the owners’ interests” was quite correct and acquired most important political significance. With the victorious development of the strike it would indeed be the general council that would find itself in the role of a commander in chief and leading force. Comrade Lenin more than once said that the revolution in England might take different forms just because the trade unions are the main organizational basis of the British labor movement. Therefore a tendency to leave the trade unions and their organs instead of conquering them is specially harmful. Such a policy objectively would only profit the opportunists of the Amsterdam International and American Federation of Labor, giving the reformists a monopoly and thus isolating the Communist Party from the masses.

e. The general strike in Great Britain has emphasized with particular force the correctness of the course steered by the Comintern and Red International of Labor Unions for unity of the trade union movement and the formation of a united fighting international of trade unions. It is only the split nature of the world trade union movement and the hopeless opportunism of the Amsterdam leaders that can explain the inadequate aid rendered to the British proletariat during the strike. The struggle against national narrowness and opportunism is brought to the forefront. The attitude of the Second and Amsterdam “Internationals” to the strike should serve as a starting point for a long and energetic campaign for the formation of a trade union international and industrial internationals such as could organize real joint parallel activities of the workers of all countries for rendering real aid to a struggling section.

f. In this connection the exit of the Soviet trade unions from the Anglo-Russian Committee should be considered absolutely inexpedient. The workers of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics sent their representatives to the Anglo-Russian Committee, not by any means because they hoped by negotiations with the higher opportunist leaders to substitute the task of revolutionary transformation of capitalist countries. Whoever has nourished such illusions has had to suffer cruel disappointment. But the trade unions of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics which have not had such illusions for a single moment entered the Anglo-Russian Committee for the sake of connections with the masses under whose pressure the trade union leaders turn to the Left. They entered the Anglo-Russian Committee in order to strengthen the fraternal connection between the working class of Great Britain and the working class of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics, in order to map out a path to restore the unity of the international trade union movement, just as in the most critical and counter-revolutionary periods of the Russian revolution (for instance July, 1917) the Bolsheviks by no means left the Soviets and their organs, did not even leave them when the Soviets disarmed the workers. The Bolsheviks ruthlessly exposed the Soviet leaders, but had the courage and patience to work systematically for the conquest of the Soviets, not by leaving them, for this would have shut them off from the section of the masses which “erred in good faith,” which still followed the Socialist Revolution and Menshevik leaders of the Soviets. The trade union leaders of Great Britain agreed to enter the Anglo-Russian Committee under the pressure of the masses. If now—and this is not only possible but very probable—they turn round to the Right and, once more bringing about a rapprochement with Amsterdam, they themselves will endeavor to break up the Anglo-Russian Committee or to take it by siege, this will be a new self-denunciation, it will bring them up against that section of the masses which still follows them. Particularly now, when the British government, entering the attack against the workers is inspiring a campaign of abuse against the proletarian republic for the aid rendered by the trade unions of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics to the British miners, abuse which by its dimensions recalls the time of the Curzon ultimatum; when on the other hand the British government is striving with all its strength to isolate the workers of Great Britain from the workers of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics—the break-up of the Anglo-Russian Committee on the part of the leaders of British trade unions would be a demonstration against the workers which would considerably push forward the process of revolutionizing the British working masses. Under such conditions the initiative for exit on the part of the trade unions of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics despite the fact that the general council refused to accept the money of the Soviet workers, would mean a blow to the cause of international unity and to the Anglo-Russian Committee, would be a very “heroic” gesture, but politically childish and inexpedient.

g. The experience of the international struggle for trade union unity which was the basic and direct object of organizing the Anglo-Russian Committee shows that this step was absolutely correct. The accusations that the trade unions of Union of Socialist Soviet Republics took the initiative in this act out of national-state considerations have been smashed into pieces by actual facts and frequently decisively condemned by the Comintern. The return once more to these accusations hashed up by the petty bourgeois “revolutionaries” particularly in Germany, reflects the general attack upon the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics and the Communist Party of Soviet Union waged by the bourgeoisie. The trade unions of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics entered the Anglo-Russian Committee not in any way tying themselves in the field of criticism, just in the same way as the Communists of Great Britain, working in the trade unions or putting forward the slogans for entering the Labor Party, do not for one moment bind themselves in the field of criticism and denunciation of the reformists. A consistent pursual of the tactics of leaving the Anglo-Russian Committee would lead to the withdrawal of the slogan for the entry of Communists in the Labor Party and to the tactics of leaving the trade unions. The task of the Leninists is not to exit from the Anglo-Russian Committee but a struggle to change its composition as well as a struggle to change the composition of all leading organs of the general council and local trade union bodies.

h. The general strike, as a method of struggle, will play a proportionally greater role in England than in any other country. This is explained not only by the fact that for the entire economy with its sharply expressed industrial nature, the stoppage of work in industry and transport has a decisive significance, but also by the fact that Great Britain has a much smaller army. The main fighting force of Great Britain is the navy. The main composition of the population is proletarian; the peasantry constitutes absolutely insignificant dimensions as compared with the proletariat. All these circumstances make the method of the general strike of decisive importance. The general strike is not here an adequate condition for victory (it must be combined with still higher methods of the class struggle), but it is an essential prerequisite of victory, a prerequisite of extremely great importance especially in Great Britain.

i. The experience of the British strike has also given great prominence to the question of international aid on the part of the workers of the other countries. Real aid on the part of the trade unions of the proletarian republics has played and is playing an important role in the development of international solidarity. The workers of all countries can clearly see that the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics is in the foremost ranks of those who are giving active help to the struggling working class of Great Britain. Just as the attitude of the Communist Party of Soviet Union and the Russian trade unions in 1923 on the eve of the German events, so the present attitude of the revolutionary proletarian organizations of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics and its proletarian masses exposes the utter futility of the ridiculous talk about the “degeneration,” the “kulakizetion”, etc. of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviki), talk indulged in by the open enemies of proletarian dictatorship and also by such “ultra-Left” elements as Korsch and others. The enormous importance of international aid must be specially emphasized. It is essential to point out that the Communist Parties of other countries have not exhausted by far all the possibilities for giving aid. The lesson taught by the actions in connection with the British strike is that mobilization on a much larger scale than before of all the forces and means is essential.

j. The experience of the general strike divulges to the British working class and also to the working class of other countries the meaning, the role and the class character of reformism, as well as of the state power. The traditional attitude to the democratic state, as a power above classes, will inevitably undergo a radical! revision on the part of the masses in spite of all the clever maneuvers of Mr. Baldwin, the Prince of Wales. etc. The British bourgeoisie, more than the bourgeoisie of any other country, maintained its power by bribing the masses (excess profits!) and receiving them (“glorious traditions of the British Constitution”!). The possibility to bribe no longer exists. The power of decep-tion however, is still great. The masses have no longer a blind belief in the reformist leaders, as was formerly the case, but they have not quite lost faith in them. Once all the lessons of the strike have been digested, reformist illusions will collapse. Exposure of these specifically British “constitutional illusions” must be one of our foremost tasks of the present day.

k. To win the masses remains the main task of the Communists. The mood of the masses in connection with the treachery of the general council points to differences within the working class. In spite of the decisions of the general council the strikers represent the most developed section of the British proletariat. They have already partly emancipated themselves and are, through the experience of the struggle, emancipating themselves more and more from the influence of the reformist leaders. The number of voluntary strike-breakers and of those bought by the bourgeoisie is miserably small. Very considerable numbers of workers returned to work at the bidding of the general council, but their composition is certainly far from uniform: All the information received goes to show that many of those who resumed work did it against their will and good judgment and are painfully digesting the experience of the strike from the point of view of its general issue as well as from the point of view of its leadership. As all the actions were under the leadership of the trade unions, the Minority Movement was bound to assume considerable importance. But it should be borne in mind that a considerable number of proletarians “are genuinely misled” which particularly applies to the workers behind the so-called “Left Wing” (Purcell & Co.). Relentless criticism of the leaders should by no means be accompanied by a closing of the ranks of the “Minority Movement.” On the contrary, those who form part of the “Minority Movement” and also all Communists must now more than ever penetrate right into the thick of the masses in order to reap a rich harvest of followers through a careful examination of the strike and its les sons,

l. The Minority Movement, which during the preparations for the general strike, during the strike itself and after its liquidation, worked hand in hand with the Communist Party of Great Britain, has proved itself to be a truly revolutionary force. Already a long time before the strike, the Minority Movement demanded the mobilization of all the forces for the pending May Day conflict. It issued the slogan: “Summoning of a special Trade Union Congress of Action to ensure full national support for the miners to achieve a victory over the mine owners” and proceeded to form committees of action in all localities. It brought pressure to bear on the general council, with respect to the miners’ question, carrying on the struggle under the slogan: “Mobilize all forces behind the miners”. Right at the beginning of the strike the Minority Movement warned against the danger of limiting the strike by purely defensive slogans. “In order to be victorious”—wrote the executive of the Minority Movement—“it is essential to take up the offensive and to deal the capitalists a severe blow.” When the strike was at its height, the Minority Movement endeavored to give the movement a political course, it organized committees of action, anti-strike-breaking corps and workers’ defense corps, it warned the masses against negotiations by the leaders behind the scenes, declaring them to be fraught with the danger of betrayal, it issued the slogan of most control over negotiations, it vigorously opposed the capitulation of the general council and called upon the workers not to forsake the miners, to refuse to have anything to do with the shameful bargain, to refuse to resume work. The Minority Movement issued at that moment a slogan which gained great popularity among the masses: “Summoning of an emergency conference of strike committees and councils of action,” in order to compel the leaders to continue the struggle. By its determined tactics the Minority Movement brought over to its side that section of workers who formerly followed the so-called “Left” leaders.

m. The Communist Party of Great Britain has, on the whole, stood the test of political ripeness. The attempts to include the Communist Party of Great Britain in the arsenal of “brakes on the revolution” do not bear criticism. The executive committee of the Communist International was quite right when it unanimously approved the position of the Communist Party of Great Britain. The latter foretold the struggle and prepared for it. From the very beginning it drove the masses towards the general strike, it issued the demand “all power to the general council,” pointing out the danger of isolating the miners. It demanded that the defensive should give place to the offensive, at the very start it issued the slogan of the overthrow of “the Baldwin government which is defending the capitalists,” the slogan of the “Workers’ Government” and the slogans on power in the various localities being transferred to the Committees of Action (see for instance the Liverpool “Workers’ Gazette”). The Communist Party was quite right in its estimation of the liquidation of the strike as a “terrible crime,” it led a vigorous attack on the “Left,” urged the continuation of the strike in spite of the order of the general council, etc. Perfectly correct also were such slogans as nationalization of the mines without compensation, full pay for the duration of the strike, suppression of the capitalist press, organization of workers’ defense corps, etc. Under the existing circumstances the Communist Party of Great Britain must continue to support the miners, must expose the treachery of the leaders, must help the Minority Movement in every possible way and must do its utmost to transform the party into a mass party of the Communist Workers of Great Britain, consolidating its position in the trade unions, in all their lower units, and recruiting more and more followers. The Communist Party was the only consistently revolutionary force following a correct course. The treachery of the leaders and the enormous re-valuation of values on the part of the mass of the workers create a basis for the development of a mass Communist Party in Great Britain.

n. The general strike brought the British proletariat face to face with the problem of power. It placed the proletariat before the necessity to set revolutionary methods against the capitalist methods, providing a way out of the capitalist chaos. Capitalism is endeavoring to save its life by condemning millions of people to war and unemployment and is systematically lowering the standard of life of the working class. The British Communist Party must give prominence to its revolutionary program. It must show to the British workers that the victory of the working class is the only way out of the present blind alley. It must show that at the time of its struggle for power and after its seizure of power, the British proletariat will have a solid rear—the continental proletariat, that the Soviet Union would throw open its enormous markets to British Socialist industry, that the British proletariat would find allies and collaborators for the economic regeneration of Great Britain on a Socialist basis, such allies being countries at present struggling desperately against British imperialism.

7. OUR IMMEDIATE TASKS.

A. The Immediate Tasks of the British Communist Party.

1. The most energetic support for the miners on strike.

2. Organization of anti-strike breaking corps workers’ defense corps.

3. Support for the slogan “nationalization of mines without compensation and workers’ control over them.”

4. Campaign for the election of new trade union organs, including the general council. Workers’ control over the leaders.

5. Exposure of Right trade union leaders and Labor Party leaders as avowed traitors.

6. Exposure of the Left as people who capitulated in spite of their majority, and who carried on a Right policy, being thereby mainly responsible for the defeat.

7. Struggle against any attempt to condone and obscure the role of the so-called Left in this strike, and severe criticism of their attempts at self-justification.

8. Exposures of the treacherous role of the parliamentary fraction of the Labor Party in this strike.

9. Promotion of new trade union leaders from the ranks. Struggle under the slogan “make way for the new leaders.”

10. Propagation of the idea of the general strike as a method of struggle.

11. Struggle against separation of economics and politics.

12. Struggle for the industrial type of federations, abolition of the relics of the craft spirit in the trade unions.

13. Increased attention to committees of action and factory and workshop committees.

14. Drawing unorganized workers into the trade unions and carrying on ideological propaganda among them.

15. Work among unemployed, drawing the unemployed into active struggle, organizing them, etc.

16. Struggle against dismissals because of participation in the May strike.

17. Struggle that the decision about expulsion of Communists from the Labor Party be rescinded.

18. Consolidation and extension of the Minority Movement and concentration of all the forces on the capture of the most important branches of industry (mining, railway and sec transport, electricity, etc.).

19. It is essential to pay special attention to the preparations for the next Trade Union Congress. This campaign should be conducted under the slogan: “Down with traitors and capitulators, elect to the congress those who favored the continuation of the struggle.”

20. Establishment of a Communist daily and also of wall newspapers, publication of leaflets, etc. Struggle against the bourgeois press and campaign in support of the revolutionary press.

21. In view of the growing sympathy for the revolutionary tactics of the Communist Party, organization of recruiting of new members, especially in the industrial districts and in the most important branches of industry.

22. Struggle for amnesty for all those sentenced for participation in or support of the strike.

23. Propaganda of the slogan in regard to power—down with Baldwin, defender of the capitalists, long live the real workers’ government.

A. The Tasks of the Comintern and Its Sections.

1. Determined and unconditional support of the British miners’ strike under the slogan: “The miners’ cause is our cause.”

2. Study and explanation to the masses of the trend, issue and causes of the defeat of the general strike in Great Britain.

3. Explanation to the masses of the role of the Amsterdam International, the Miners’ International and the international Social Democracy who practically undermined and sabotaged the strike.

4. Exposure of the treacherous role of the Right and so-called “Left” leaders of the general council and the Labor Party.

5. More intensive struggle for the unity of the national and international trade union movement and for the workers’ united front.

6. Struggle against the disruption and desertion of the trade unions. Struggle for the organization of the unorganized.

7. Special attention to the preparation of the masses for the impending social conflicts and to the establishment of autonomous organizations (committees of action, strike committees, factory and workshop committees, etc.) in the course of the strike.

8. Intensification of Communist activity in the trade unions. Formation of revolutionary minorities and consolidation of the Profintern and all organizations affiliated to it.

9. Special attention should be paid to support for the British Minority Movement on the part of the Comintern, the Profintern and all Communist Parties.

The characteristic feature of the present world situation is the position [word missing] main component part of the world economy: the position in the U.S.A.—still a progressive stronghold of the capitalist order, the position in the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics—for the time being the main foundation of the growing forces of the international proletariat, and the position in the countries of the old capitalism, the classical representative of which is the imperialist and colonial British Empire with the whole complex of its dominions and dependencies, from London to Peking and Calcutta.

The most characteristic feature of the present moment is: the classical state of old capitalism par excellence is becoming disrupted from two directions: from the East (China) and from the direction of the proletariat of the mother country (the strike). The national-revolutionary actions in China and the action of the British proletariat emphasized still more the utter relativity of capitalist stabilization. And this is something new which is paramount importance for the correct appraisal of the international situation. But to appreciate this situation on the strength of a definite historical period, one must take into consideration that in China and also in Great Britain we have to reckon with the fact of a temporary defeat of the revolutionary forces. A definite revolutionary situation does not yet exist. Therefore, the declaration of the Communist International with respect to two possible perspectives for the near future remains in the main correct. British events have lent emphasis to the perspective of a revolutionary elan. Communist Parties must do their utmost in the struggle for the realization of this actual perspective, and it is from this world point of view that the Communist International has to perform its duty towards the struggling British proletarians. United front tactics, the capture of the masses—as the main task—remain as before the foundation of the tac: tics of the Communist International. Vacillations within it are inevitable. Inevitable and essential is also the struggle against the Right as well as against the Left—the struggle for a correct Leninist policy. But the formula about the struggle against the Right and the Leit (this Leninist formula was on the strength of historical reasons and in connection with specific conditions in Germany substituted by the formula of struggle against the Right and ultra-Left) must not be applied eclectically and not from the viewpoint of all round justice, it must be concretely deciphered and the main blow must be directed towards the place where this or that peril is particularly great. Only such a method—Lenin’s method—guarantees unity of the revolutionary will. It has stood the test of practical experience and is continually tested by the consolidation of proletarian dictatorship in the Soviet country where the proletariat has given one more proof of its internationalism, a country which in spite of all the attacks of the international bourgeoisie, the reformists and the infuriated petty-bourgeois “revolutionaries,” remains in the stronghold of the international proletarian revolution and of the vanguard of the Communist International.

The Workers Monthly began publishing in 1924 as a merger of the ‘Liberator’, the Trade Union Educational League magazine ‘Labor Herald’, and Friends of Soviet Russia’s monthly ‘Soviet Russia Pictorial’ as an explicitly Party publication. In 1927 Workers Monthly ceased and the Communist Party began publishing The Communist as its theoretical magazine. Editors included Earl Browder and Max Bedacht as the magazine continued the Liberator’s use of graphics and art.

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