The conflict with imperialism, particularly British, and the possibility of war against the Soviet Union was central to the framing of the debate in the mid-1920s between the Left Opposition and the leadership majority in the Communist Party. Here gives his analysis as an Oppositionist on the threat and how to meet it.

‘Is the Soviet Union Threatened by Intervention?’ by Karl Radek from International Press Correspondence. Vol. 7 No. 13. February 10, 1927.

The answer to this question has already been given by the resolution of the 14th Party Congress of the C.P.S.U. the clause with regard to this point reads as follows:

“The relative stabilisation and the so-called “pacification” of Europe–under the hegemony of Anglo-American capital–have led to a whole system of economic and political blocs, the last of which are the Conference at Locarno and the so-called “guarantee treaties”, the spearhead of which is pointed at the Soviet Union. These blocs and conspiracies which are screened by the League of Nations, which professes to be pacifist, and the hypocritical clamour of the 2nd International about disarmament, are in essentials nothing more nor less than a summoning of forces for a new war. As a counter-weight to this Bloc of the capitalist States under the Anglo-American, hegemony, which is accompanied, by a terrific growth of armaments, and which therefore contains in embryo the danger of new wars including the danger of intervention, we see the development of friendly relations between the proletariat of the countries, and the proletariat of the Soviet Union under the slogan of, fight for peace, fight against new imperialist wars and against armed attacks on the Soviet Union.”

This common danger, the essence of which is that the process of the restoration of capitalist economy to the pre-war level is bringing up with elemental force the question of new markets and, in its further course, the question of the destruction of the Socialist State system in the Soviet Union which came into being in 1917 and has since gained in strength–this common danger has been intensified in the last few years thanks to two events of vast importance: The fight of the British miners and the victorious advance of the Chinese revolution.

Both events which have rained heavy blows on Great Britain, the leading capitalist State of Europe, have rendered the relations between Great Britain and the Soviet Union more acute and called forth mad outbreak of hatred against the Soviet Union in Great Britain, thus creating the possibility of a threatened conflict between Great Britain and the Soviet Union. The alarm sounded by the Moscow Party Conference and the appeal for the mobilisation of public opinion in the Soviet Union, are completely justified. The intensification of the anger, however, demands not only the most alert attention, not only military, preparations so that we may not be taken by surprise, it also demands political preparations, i.e. a number of well thought out political measures for the fight against the approaching danger, with the object of averting it.

This makes it necessary not to confine ourselves to general allusions to the growing danger, but to give a concrete picture of the world situation with all the contradictory tendencies arising from it. Needless to say, in attempting to present such a picture, we shall not make it our object to offer a photographic reproduction. We shall only give a survey of the situation, placing in the foreground those factors which allow us to throw light on the question of intervention.

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Great Britain alone can be the organiser of an imperialist campaign against the Soviet Union. The United States of America, although they are trying to represent the Soviet Union as their rival in Nicaragua, have still too little interest in the capitalist penetration of the Soviet Union to force the opening up of the markets of the Soviet Union; as things stand, however, any participation of the United States in a possible European coalition against the Soviet Union would mean nothing more nor less than the breaking open of a safe, the contents of which would fall to the share of the competitors.

The United States of America have not yet thought out to a conclusion any policy in the Far East. They vacillate between the desire of the bourgeois circles of New York and Washington, who have a wider outlook, to help China to achieve unity, so that they may take possession of this vast united market, and revolutionary China is in Shanghai and Hankow. This vacillation in itself is a sufficient reason for the United States not bursting with rage at the fact that the mere existence of the Soviet Union is a support to the Chinese freedom movement.

The natural result of this is that the United States do not yet form any reliable cover in the rear for Great Britain. Further, the absence of any determined, active, anti-Soviet policy of the United States means that the European countries in which the United States have invested enormous sums of money and which still gaze with rapture on the coffers of Wall Street, look to America, trying to find an answer to the questions Are the United States prepared to stake their capital invested in Europe on the imperialist attack of Britain against the Soviet Union?

Great Britain has not yet a reliable cover in the rear in the United States. What is the position with regard to cover in Asia?

In view of the present financial and economic situation of Great Britain, a simultaneous attack against China and the Soviet Union must be regarded as out of the question; as, however, British imperialism cannot hope to conclude a bargain with the Soviet Union with regard to China, its policy must be directed towards causing a split between China and the Soviet Union, towards aiming a powerful blow at the revolutionary forces of China, towards concluding a bargain with the Chinese bourgeoisie, only to withdraw the concessions made to China at some future date, when it has defeated the Soviet Union.

We will not enter too closely into the prospects of this policy from the point of view of the internal forces of the Chinese revolution. We will only say that the chief difficulty for the British bourgeoisie is a fact which it takes but little into consideration, the fact that the motive force of the Chinese revolution is not so much the endeavour of the Chinese, bourgeoisie to achieve national unity, to liberate China from the yoke of foreign capitalism, it is rather the increasing distress of the masses of peasants which renders any stabilisation of a bourgeois regime in China impossible for a long time to come.

In China, Great Britain, has to deal not only with the Chinese but also with numerous imperialist rivals. Can it rely on their support in its endeavours? The behaviour of France, Japan and even of the United States towards the British note to China on December 16th 1926, is evidence that the Asiatic Bloc of the imperialist Powers has, at any rate, not yet crystallised. Some of the imperialist Powers regarded Great Britain’s proposals as an attempt to appropriate the part of a “friend to China” which is being played by the United States; others, such as Japan and China, were of the opinion that Great Britain was attempting to take the East into her own hands and to make it leadership in the an appendage of British policy. The fact that the British Imperial Conference approved of the construction of the naval base at Singapore, shows how little Great Britain is convinced that she can rely on the support of the imperialist Powers in the Far East.

In Asia Minor and in Central Asia it has not been possible to encircle the Soviet Union. The best evidence that Great Britain has not succeeded in buying the Turkey of Mustapha Kemal is the fact that Great Britain is supporting Italy’s anti-Turkish tendencies. The greatest success of which Great Britain can boast is in Persia. In Afghanistan, the policy of Great Britain was not crowned with success.

Even in Arabia, where it seemed as though the bargain struck with Ibn Saud and the policy of the mailed fist in Mesopotamia would guarantee complete peace for Great Britain, whilst the defeat of France in Syria would be a sure protection for Great Britain against French intrigues, even in Arabia we find Italy suddenly appearing on the scenes in Yemen with an independent colonial policy. Even though this policy can be explained as being solely due to Italy’s efforts to find objects of compensation for negotiations in the Mediterranean, it is in any case a fact that even Italy’s considerable dependence on Great Britain does not shield the latter from surprises.

As regards the question of the Mediterranean, the significance of which has greatly increased in recent times, the situation is not yet such that Great Britain can afford to disregard it. On the contrary, the characteristic feature of the situation in the Mediterranean is the increasing unrest caused by the appearance of Italian imperialism which, feeling itself strengthened by the growing industrialisation of Italy, is striving for a “place in the sun”. Italian imperialism does not yet know itself what it should demand, South Anatolia, Syria or Tunis; whether it should engage in a fight with Yugoslavia for supremacy in the Adriatic. It is in that stage of putting out feelers, through which German imperialism passed in the last decade of the nineteenth century.

Great Britain is supporting Italy in order to ensure for herself the support of the latter against France; as soon however as she has succeeded through this manoeuvre in exercising pressure on France, she will try to play the part of a mediator between France and Italy, as she has already tried to play this part between France and Germany since the war. All this implies that British policy cannot at present turn its back on the questions of the Mediterranean and concentrate its efforts on aiming a blow at the Soviet Union.

One of the chief sections of the front of British diplomacy is of course in Western and Central Europe. British imperialism is carrying on an incessant struggle against two tendencies. On the one hand it is trying to diminish the conflicting interests between Germany, and France which, in the intensified form in which they existed from 1919 to 1923, bound it to the Rhine. Without the intervention of British imperialism, France would have become master of Europe. Thanks to the help of the United States, British policy was crowned with success.

Great Britain however, must say: Alas, the victory is ours! The steel trust, which unites the German steel industry with that of France and Belgium, the political negotiations in Thoiry, have revealed to Great Britain the danger of an approach of this kind between the two continental Powers. This would considerably have increased their independence with regard to Great Britain. The very haste with which Germany endeavoured at Romsey to testify that it was aiming at an economic agreement with Great Britain also and that, if the metal industry in Germany had formed a trust with that of France, Germany’s chemical industry was aiming at striking a bargain with that of Britain this haste in itself shows how the uneasiness in Britain must be taken into account. All this proves that Great Britain cannot simply, at her own sweet will, order the forces of France and Germany to attack the Soviet Union.

Let us now see how things are on the Western frontier of the Soviet Union, with its immediate neighbours, who would be the first destined to carry out the British attack against the Soviet Union. The centre-point of this attack would of course be Poland. Her attitude towards the Soviet Union is the least known factor, and that for the simple reason that her internal forces have not yet crystallised.

If we take the Polish bourgeoisie, we find that it has no obvious economic aims which would prompt it to embark on a war against the Soviet Union. It is too weak to skim off the cream in the event of a British victory over the Soviet Union. It can only gain economic advantages by the establishment of independent economic relations with the Soviet Union. Only one section of the Polish landed proprietors is interested in a war against the Soviet Union. These are the landed proprietors of the border districts who are sitting on the volcano of the White Russian and the Ukrainian peasants, and might speculate that a victory over the Soviet Union would give them the possibility of finally settling with the White Russian and Ukrainian peasantry. The most far-seeing elements among the Polish landowning class grasp the fact that it is impossible to annihilate the millions of White Russian and Ukrainian peasants, that every territorial acquisition in the East implies an increase and an intensification of the national question and the peasant question in Poland.

Nevertheless it would be a mistake to rely on the soothing voice of the Polish Press, which is at present expressing itself in peaceful terms with regard to relations with the Soviet Union. The dictatorship of the soldatesca in the person of Pilsudski is the element which prevents a more or less exact political estimate being made. The internal difficulties of Poland, the impossibility of continuing for long to spend 45% of the Budget on the army, all this may create a situation which will drive Pilsudski to risk an adventure. It is, however, certain that even Pilsudski cannot make up his mind to such an adventure without being sure of having a cover in the rear.

The central question in the danger with which the Soviet Union is threatened by Poland, is the question of the relations between Poland and Germany. The stabilisation of German capital has led to a strengthening of Germany in its foreign policy. By joining the League of Nations and signing the Treaty of Locarno, for which she paid by recognising her Western frontiers as something finally settled for good and all, Germany has been forced to adopt the line of the supposed least resistance, which means that the question of the revision of her frontiers with Poland has been brought into the foreground. Germany has of course vowed three times a week that she does not dream of setting this frontier right by force of arms, but even the Treaty of Versailles recognised the theory of evolution and said with Heraclitus that “everything is in a state of flux”. Germany is said to be doing nothing except helping this tendency a little by bringing up the question of the Corridor.

The negotiations which Germany is now carrying on in Paris with Great Britain and France with regard to the so-called “remaining questions” of disarmament, have shown that Germany is not only making propaganda, but is even consolidating her strategic positions on the borders between Poland and Germany by strengthening the fortresses which were left to her by the Treaty of Versailles for fighting purposes in case the Bolshevist Huns should attack. The French Press accuses Germany of constructing 54 concrete defences, 20 kilometers long and 3 kilometers broad to the South and East of Konigsberg; it maintains that Germany has succeeded in building 20 such defences in the district of the Masurian Lakes South of Lotzen. At the same time, according to the assertions of the French Press, similar constructions have been built to the East of the line Kustrin to Frankfort and round Glogau, five kilometers from the Polish frontier; they are said to be 1.5 to 6 meters high and are intended to form a base in the. case of war against Poland. The French maintain that these constructions were started after Locarno.

Poland accuses Germany of having thus violated the Treaty of Versailles, which only conceded to Germany the right to maintain the old system of fortresses. General Pawels, the German military plenipotentiary, answers quite reasonably and logically that, if the old system is to be maintained, it must be developed, as otherwise it would lose its value.

The Germans are right when they point to the fact of the defensive character of these constructions, and there can be as little doubt that, if Germany were given the Corridor with the fortresses of Graudenz and Thorn, which would place in her hands the means of crossing the Vistula, it would greatly strengthen her strategic position in the East. For this reason there is great opposition in Poland to the so-called Martini idea, which was proposed in 1919 and brought up again in 1925, suggesting that Poland be given an outlet to the sea through the Lithuanian Corridor with Memel in exchange for the surrender to Germany of the Corridor with Danzig. In the so-called Danzig Corridor more than 80% of the population is Polish, but the Lithuanian Corridor would pass through an exclusively Lithuanian peasant population, which hates Poland and the Polish landowners.

Furthermore, in order to gain Lithuania’s consent to a bargain of this kind, it would be necessary to consent to a union with Lithuania and to hand Vilna over to her, i.e. to put on the order of the day, the question of the transformation of the whole of Poland into a federation; for neither the White Russians nor the Ukrainians would be reconciled to a situation which would grant autonomy to Lithuania and leave them in complete subjugation to the Polish Voyvods.

For a long time, rumours were in circulation to the effect that Pilsudski was not disinclined to enter into this bargain so as to have Germany as a rear cover should it come to a reckoning with the Soviet Union. An end was put to these rumours by the declaration of Zaleski, the Polish Foreign Minister, that any step taken towards changing the frontiers between Poland and Germany would lead to war. Thus, it cannot be said that British diplomacy has yet succeeded in forming a bloc between Poland and Germany. The point of Polish policy is at present directed against Germany.

In the same way, Great Britain has not yet succeeded in bringing about friendly relations between Poland and Lithuania although she has worked hard towards this end. The seizure of power in Lithuania by the clerical Fascist Government which, from the social point of view, is of the same breed as the Polish one, facilitates an understanding; for it is clear that the Catholic priests can more easily come to an agreement with the Polish large landowners than could the parties which express the hatred of the Lithuanian peasantry for the Polish landed proprietors. The fact that the Fascist Government relies on the army, i.e. on the support of the peasant and nationalist tendencies, does not lessen the danger of this chaffering, for peasant masses who are not led by the workers, are not capable of giving active expression to their attitude of mind, whilst a numerically small corps of officers is easily bought for a mess of pottage.

Poland and Lithuania have so far not come to an agreement; and if we carefully follow events in Lithuania, we can assure ourselves that they are not so much the result of Poland’s influence or of a tendency of Lithuania to lean towards Poland, as of Great Britain’s interference and of an inclination on the part of the Lithuanian Fascists to favour the British attack, on the Soviet Union.

By way of concluding our survey of the situation on the Western frontiers of the Soviet Union, we will say a few words about Roumania and the Baltic neighbours of the Soviet Union. The latter have not yet definitely formed an alliance with Poland, nor are they a party to any attack on the Soviet Union. As long as peace lasts or, to put it more exactly, as long as there is any hope of its being maintained, they reckon with the fact that the Russian market is for them an economic outlet to their economic blind alley. As however they are on the sea and within the reach of the guns of British warships, they will, in the decisive moment, submit to Great Britain’s wishes, with the possible exception of Finland. As regards Roumania, her position is not only determined by her fear of losing Bessarabia, but also by the fear of being isolated should Poland be defeated. This means that there is a certain connection between the relations of the Soviet Union to Poland on the one hand and to Roumania on the other hand.

These are the main features of the picture of the international situation, as we see it. What conclusions are to be drawn from this picture?

The first conclusion is that, in spite of the sharpening of the relations between Great Britain and the Soviet Union, the diplomatic preparations for the British attack are not yet completed. The international picture is still extremely variegated, the international contradictions are not yet sufficiently polarized, they are not yet sufficiently grouped round a single axis as was the case in 1914. The central point of dissension in the future, within the camp of the imperialists, will be the conflict of interests between Great Britain and the United States. This conflict of interests has not yet matured either objectively or in the consciousness of the bourgeoisie of the two countries. It is just this which makes such combinations possible as the plan proposed by Hearst (the American journalist and well-known publisher, who owns a number of newspapers in the United States), a plan for an alliance between Great Britain and the United States as the central axis of the international situation.

Thanks to the immaturity of the contradictions between Great Britain and the United Staes, the imperialist contradictions of second magnitude in Europe the conflicting interests between Great Britain and France and between France and Italy have not yet grouped themselves round this axis. For the time being, the friendly relations between France and Germany are directed both against Great Britain and against America. This muddle, the economic causes of which are very deep-rooted, does not yet permit of the enmity against the Soviet Union being regarded as the central question of world politics. This justifies our hoping that the policy of the Soviet Union still has the time and the opportunity to counteract the formation of an anti-Soviet Bloc.

It would, however, be quite wrong to imagine that Great Britain will only decide to attack the Soviet Union when preparations have been made to a hundred per cent. She may try to drive Poland into war, calculating that, if she succeeds in provoking this war, no alternative will be left to the Baltic States and to Roumania, that the fact of the war will compel Germany and France to come to a decision, and that this decision might be brought to a head by fanning their imperialist lusts. Should this come off, British diplomacy will succeed in forcing Poland to come to an agreement with Germany in respect of her Western frontiers.

For this reason, the fight against the British war policy must proceed simultaneously with the attempt to frustrate Great Britain’s plans of forming blocs in the East and in the West, while the greatest attention must be paid to the question of our relations with the nearest neighbours of the Soviet Union, of preparations for defence and of the political mobilisation of the masses for defence. These two tasks not only do not contradict one another, on the contrary, they are closely related to one another. The will of the masses to resist with the greatest determination any attack on the Soviet Union will grow in the measure that we succeed in showing the masses that the Soviet Union has neglected nothing which is necessary to ensure peace. The policy of the Soviet Union, Lenin’s policy, has never had anything in common with the policy of sabre rattling. Lenin knew that for the masses of the people war is such an evil, demands such sacrifices, that it can only be demanded of them after every means of preserving peace has been tried.

A policy of this kind is at the same time the best way of mobilising the proletariat of Western Europe. The demand for peace and the hostility to war are both equally characteristic of the proletariat in post-war times. By showing the proletariat that no one is so decided a defender of peace as the Republic of the Workers which, while defending peace defends also not only the lives of the masses of workers and peasants, but also socialist construction, we are creating the foundation for the broadest application of the tactics of the united front in the struggle for peace. The attitude of mind of these working masses will be of paramount importance in deciding the question of intervention or should the proletariat of Western Europe not prove strong enough to prevent intervention in deciding its issue.

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.

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