The toiler. [volume] (Cleveland, Ohio) 1919-1922, 1920-07-02
THE WHY AND WHEREFORE OF THE WAR AGAINST RUSSIA

peace time," he goes on. War is
visualized in the reeesses of that pene-
trating and intriguing brain as q
permanent institution functioning con-
tinuously. The War Cabinet, declares
Lord Treowen, must form ga perman-
ent part of our organization. "Our
armed preparedness" must continue,
''in spit of Leagues of Nations or
Treaties, or anything else." Precisely.
As a solvent Of Empire, real Lea
que of Nations is only one degree less
dangerous than Russian Socialist
State. For the principles embodied in
the Covenant are incompatible with
the continued subjugation of polite
ally consciens alien peoples. That is
why the British imperial mind is
fundamentally hostile to the creation
of a real League of Nations, and has
always been. What an interesting study
is that mind in its rare moments Of
expansion-as when Lord Curzon
boasts, speaking of the war, that:
"The actual degree to which we were
prepared for all the developments that
ensued, was in excess of that even of
the most able and scientific of our
foes" Compare with the declarations
of our unreadiness put up by Mr..
Lloyd George for the benefit of an
ignorant public!) Get behind this flow
of dignified orator. The smooth talk
centres wholly round imperial respon,
sibilities, the next war, the engines
whcrewithal to wage it-"the modern
long range gun which is even row
being considered. Do we possess, asks
Lord Stanhope, ga body which is
capable of co-ordinating our policy
and our ornaments, that is the
question. What Of the "new bases"
for our Fleet7 The present ones are
not those "we shall use in future
war;, the strength of the various
nations of the world having been
"entirely altered by the Peace" Let
us hunt round for our new foe, and
prepare our "imperial defense" against
him2 Americaa Japan' Socialist Rus
sia7 Our imperialists need one. Our
command of the sea, land and air,
impels one.
Why a Socialist Russia is anathema..
To this type Of mind-and it is the
mind which presides over our national
destinies today--a Socialist Russia
straddling across Eastern Europe in.
to western and northern Asia, with
its pestilent doctrines Of solo-deter-
mination, its educational revolutions,
its precepts Of human quality, its war
upon the institution of war and
against Imperialism which keeps that
institution alive, is anathema. The
determination to stamp upon it at all
costs is as implacable as that other
determination, expressed by Lord
Birkenhead the other day, to exhaust
the military resources of the Empire
rather than give away one jot or title
to Ireland's claims. We may yet see
Gurkhas in Dublin and Cork. Why
notG Our Ally has Negroes at Mayence
and Wiosbaden. That is the spirit
which drives Poland to suicide in
another desperate attempt to over.
throw Socialist Russia, and fills the
matches of the "Jolly George" with
munitions for Warsaw.
Then consider the affront given by
Socialist Russia to the most cherished
privileges and preserves of the British
ruling class, embodied in the Foreign
Office. The shrewdest blow ever struck
at Secret Diplomacy - without which
militarist Imperialism could not
function-was delivered when Lenin
and Trotsky published the Secret
Treaties. The offense is as unforgiva.
BILE as the revelation it occasioned was
unprecedented. The leaven of that
revelation still works, and will go on
working. A socialist State whose di.
plomatic relations with other States
are open, is a perpetual menace to i'm
perialist States - a fortiori to the
greatest Of them all. The discredit into
which Western diplomacy has fallen
as the result Of Lenin and Trotsky Is
action is so profound; the dangers to
be apprehended from the future are so
enormous for the existing Order that
the Russian wreckers Of the occult
power which rules the peoples lives
must be broken.
These are some Of the reasons why
the struggle against Socialist Russia,
although it has all the appearance of
a fight between Capitalism and Social.
ism, is, while including this, something
far bigger. French capitalism may feel
itself menaced. But British imperialism,
of the Roman type knows its very ex.
istence is at stake.